


shelter as we go

by fondleeds



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: 1960s, Explicit Language, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Minor Violence, Past Character Death, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-24
Updated: 2018-10-24
Packaged: 2019-08-06 22:20:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 75,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16396178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fondleeds/pseuds/fondleeds
Summary: Louis looks at him like his words might break him, glass about to splinter, one wrong footfall away from shattering into a million tiny pieces.“Hey,” Harry breathes, and he knows, meeting Louis’ eyes, that his words could break him easy as anything. He almost wants Louis to bring his boot down.-AU. Nova Scotia, 1968.





	shelter as we go

**Author's Note:**

> hiii all. i'm back!
> 
> this fic is over a year in the making now and it feels a little surreal that i'm finally posting it. it's one of those stories that i started, then stopped, then chipped away at here and there until it consumed all my attention again. and now it's finally here. 
> 
> a few notes before we get started if you can be bothered to sit through my rambling, feel free to skip:
> 
> the inspiration for this fic comes from a book called island by alistair macleod, which is a collection of short stories. the first story in that book is called the boat. to this day i think it might actually hold the title for the most i've ever cried over literature, along with the rest of the stories in that book in general. i really wanted to explore and expand on the themes that macleod uses and i would 100% recommend island to anyone that wants to read it. 
> 
> i've taken a more fictional-esque approach to the nova scotian landscape. a causeway was built over the strait of canso in 55, but for the purpose of the story it doesn't exist/isn't mentioned. i've also left out a lot of the mining history; the story was getting too big for me to handle so to those who are familiar with the area sorry about that!! 
> 
> i always feel like it’s a bit spoilery for the impact of things to list so much in the tags, but please do heed the warnings there. this is a heavy fic at times so if you have any questions about the tags etc you can always message me on tumblr!!
> 
> i think thats all?? i put my heart and soul into this and i’m so incredibly nervous to share it?? i hope you guys like this one.
> 
> title from promise by ben howard. playlist [here.](https://open.spotify.com/user/gonewilde/playlist/6ZSCDAH2temC7K0byU5Fxe?si=N7dRHhK_SXWkbDsljaXugQ)
> 
> ♡

 

_‘I have understood how the scar becomes a star, I have felt the flake of fire fall, miraculous and pentecostal. My yesterdays walk with me. They keep step, they are gray faces that peer over my shoulder.’_

 

_William Golding, Free Fall._

 

_-_

  

_Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. 1968._

 

The tail end of winter is a screaming whip. 

Its curve carries with it a flurry of chilled, skin-prickling gusts, stirring the waves into chasms of navy and stark white, shooting foamy residue up to the clouds, hovering low and grey and spitting mist. Heady squalls bring prickly seafoam up onto deck, skidding and scraping along his cheeks and turning them bright red. For miles both left and right there’s nothing but ocean and the grey-white of the sky, and with every dip the ferry takes down a heightened wave, it feels as though for that stomach-swooping moment, they’ll be swallowed whole by the sea and its gaping mouth. 

Harry stands at the tip of the deck, hips cradled by the slippery white of the bow, so much so that if he leant forward enough, if he lost his balance just for a moment, he’d topple into the thrashing water and be lost under the waves. Everything smells of raw salt and rain, of damp sand despite their distance from the shore. Another billowed gust pulses up from the water, and it shakes the thin glaze over his eyes, pricks at it with cold nails. Shaking, he pulls his coat tighter around himself, tucking his shoulders against his exposed neck, where the skin is goose-pimpled and thin, veins gone blue and purple. 

“Hey!” 

He turns slowly, blinks against the howl of another squall, the rain falling like sleet now. One of the ferry-men is hurrying towards him, white-faced and dark-eyed, looking reproachful and sour as he shudders against the cold. 

“Get inside, will you, b’y?” he says. The ferry dips again, and the fragile bones in Harry’s body creak and dent against the hard lines of the boat. “You’ll catch your death out here, tell y’ right fuckin’ now. C’mon, then.” 

“Sorry,” Harry says, bristled and stiff. “I wanted to watch the water.” 

“You’ll be swimming in’t in a minute if you don’t get inside,” the man says, already retreating backward to the cabin, rolling his eyes. “Lord knows I’m not jumpin’ in after you.” 

Harry’s eyelashes are sticky with salt, the thin of his neck wet and dewy with chill, a slick silver. The ocean roars again, and through a spray of shaky mist, the shadows of land blur into reality. With another sweeping lull, the ferry chugs along the rough valleys of a wave, and the rise of Harry’ stomach feels looped with rope, threatening to fling him backwards, to tug so sharply that he’s catapulted back to the mainland. But then the ferry rights itself, and the rope cuts loose, disintegrates and turns his insides to a queasy mess, like it was never even there. 

His eyes gloss over in the wind, far removed from what once was, and what is going to be.

-

The shoreline is a wonky, dented horseshoe of a thing, with the harbour nestled at the centre of its rusty heart, and the rhythm of the waves hitting the algae-covered beams is its weighted, thudding heartbeat. Long strips of overturned beach reside either side of it, damp, dark grains of sand tangled with maroon and olive shreds of seaweed, some of the tattered strips floating out into the water and wrapping themselves around the shaky structure of the wharf. Tiny homes dot the edges of the beach, some so close to the water that the vicious spray of seafoam knocks on front doors, rests on stoops. The terrain is flat and muddled with sand, until, in the near distance, the earth jumps in a sudden elevation of jagged mountains, green and stone, of swooped hills undertoned with red and orange and earth, stretching up into the shadow of foggy clouds that drape themselves along the treeline, starting a steady decline on to the town. The cliffs are grey and wrinkled with dark lines, and they hold Cape Breton captive. 

With unsteady movements, Harry tucks his bag over his shoulder and reaches for the slippery metal ladder beside the boat, heart lurching as the ferry bobs back and forth, swinging itself towards the structure and then back out again tauntingly. On shaky legs, he starts his slow climb up the slimy handrail, up onto the old pier that’s jutting out from the steady length of the wharf. The trawlers have taken ownership of that space, large boats and larger men hauling nets and icy baskets of fish. He pauses his climb for a moment to watch them, the dirty glint of their rubber coats and the cracked skin of their faces, salt wedged into every crevice, until a man behind him clears his throat, and Harry stumbles with little grace up onto the fraying wood, splinters threatening the smooth of his palms. The pier is stained with bird shit and sun-dried fish scales, and as he hauls himself up his hands drag through it. Clinging onto his bag, he stands, closes his eyes against the lurch of the pier, and slowly pushes through the wind, ignoring the sway of the beams bellow, ocean spray dusting his cheeks and turning them shiny. 

As he approaches the solidity of the wharf, he hopes he doesn’t look at lost as he feels, though he knows that surely, he does. An overbearing stench of chum and fish wafts up from everywhere, clinging to salt-red skin and wiry white hair. Sharp needles of chill nip at his ankles and his thin wrists, sliding up the cuffs of his coat and sinking fangs into the exposed skin of his neck. Half-stumbling, he crowds into himself and slows his pace out of nerves more than anything else, flinching when a large set of waves slap against the wood, foam exploding with a hiss and spitting along his back. 

He doesn't even know what the woman he spoke to on the phone looks like, and in the fuzz of his brain, he’d forgotten her name the moment he’d hung up, buried under blankets and shaking at the very thought of packing his bag. There were only two other men on the boat with him as passengers, but they’re long gone now, clapping the backs of fishermen as they stroll past, quick murmurs of greetings exchanged and lost in the howl of wind. Once he’s taken the few steps up onto the wharf, he stands listless for a moment, frozen with an impending fear.

“Harry?”

He turns and meets the eye of a young woman. _Kenna_ , the name sparks in his mind. He reaches his shaking hand out to meet hers, flushed at how cold his palm feel in comparison to her own. She’s got a whip of black hair that even pulled atop her head obscures and ruffles her features, and by tucking each side behind her ears the heart shape of her face is made brightly pale. 

“Hello,” he says. A man stumbles past them with a giant barrel, and Harry teeters awkwardly to step out of his way, clinging onto the worn straps of his bag desperately.  

“You’re in some state, huh?” Kenna grins. She looks like a shark, watching him watch the flurry of movement around them. “Don’t worry, them lot aren’t as greasy as they look.” 

She leads them on a dodging stroll around rope and dirt-streaked buoys and bloody buckets of water, around the scruffy fishermen who glare down at him when he passes and accidentally makes eye contact, looking away skittishly, then back up again like a pinball. Quickly, he learns the best place for his gaze to stay is on his feet, but even with his head tucked away like this, the burn of eyes watching follows him all the way along the wharf. He’s clearly out of place here in his boots and his fluffy, worn coat, his newly trimmed hair. He shares their grit though, at least, the holes in his elbows and the swollen under eyes that puff up like balloons holding water, his fresh and clean, theirs ocean-tinted. Already, he can feel salt stinging at the torn cuticles around his thumbs and pointer fingers.

As they walk along the beach, Kenna speaks at him fast and loose-lipped. She’s got a tongue that his father would have fainted at, and he feels that way too, almost, in a slight state of overwhelm as he attempts to keep his footing steady among the sinking, wet sand while Kenna swears a storm and talks so fast that he hardly understands a word she’s saying, grammar all jumbled together and lost under the thrash of waves trying to reach their feet. Maybe that’s just him being sanctimonious though, and internally, he shivers at the thought. 

The houses on the forefront of the water are akin to a frontline, ready for battle. They’re the first line of defence it seems, seafoam exploding and reaching for the frosted windows. Behind them lies the rest of Cape Breton, hidden and tucked in the shadows of the mountains, just a single, thin strip of road leading past the hills, a tiny speck of a thing. By the time they’ve walked halfway down the sand, Harry’s soaked, lashes and eyebrows clumped and mused, hair drooping and dotting his forehead with little pearls. The wind, somehow, seems to become more harsh, more unforgiving the closer they trek to the cliffside. With that harshness comes the hostility of those who watch them as they walk, men with careful eyes and cigarettes dangling from their cracked lips, women lingering like ghoulish shadows behind windows. 

Kenna, however, seems unaffected by the obvious crackle to the air surrounding them, her hair cutting into Harry’s eyes when the wind tangles with it, mouth in that constant shark-toothed smile. Harry keeps his head down and fiddles nervously with the strap of his bag, only quickening his pace when a man steps slowly off his stoop and down into the sand, puffing out thick smoke, his head following them as they pass. Finally, though, Kenna comes to an abrupt stop, so sudden that Harry almost collides with her back while she fishes around in her pocket.

The house they’ve stopped in front of looks ready to collapse. Whilst the rest of the houses on the shoreline gradually tilt towards each other, tucking their faces towards the heart of the harbour, this one faces directly to the sea, the lingering waves an audible fizz they’re so close to the stoop. The window by the door is cracked and frosty edged. The first step is broken straight down the middle. Harry stares up at it, the skin of his neck prickling when ocean spray brushes there.

“Gotcha,” Kenna hisses, grin still in place as she plucks a rusted key from her pocket and starts up the two and a half stairs to the front door. Harry follows reluctantly. 

Kenna has to slam the full weight of her body against the door to get it open. It does so with a shuddery, withdrawn creak that seems to echo through the entirety of the hall and up the walls, almost like the house has become so brittle, lips sucked back into its teeth against the constant battering of the seawind, that the shove of the door opening unrolls a spine-tingling shake through the wood, the cold air finally rushing in exuberantly at full force. Everything looks water-clogged and warped, the dark richness of it all stripped away into these muted browns and dirty creams, glass fogged up with dust and chill.  

The first story is one room, and it’s barren. Empty hooks line the walls by the front door, empty cupboards left open line the walls by the hob. The couch looks old and worn to pieces, as do the chipped legs of the dining room chairs, chunks missing from the thickly built table. Empty shelving clogged with settled dirt, rugs tangled with spiderwebs. A window stretches itself up to the ceiling, and from it, greying, off-blue light bathes his skin when he stands by it, peering through the dust to the shaky mirage of the ocean, blurring together because of the cloud-like spray.

“Well.” Kenna claps her hands together, abrasively loud in the clogged quiet. “You let me know if you got any troubles with the place, right? I best be off.” 

“Oh,” Harry says, blinking when she drops the rusty key into his palm. “Alright. Thank you.” 

“You be careful out here,” she says. “You let me know if that water gets too close, right?”

“Right,” he echoes slowly. 

Kenna hovers by the doorway, and Harry has to look away then, from the careful curiousness in her eyes, the way she’s blatantly unsure of whether to leave him on his own or not. He closes his eyes, and doesn’t open them again until the door shuts behind her, until she’s a red speck among the smudge of rain and ocean outside. The house shudders again, a full body shiver from toe to nose. Harry steadies his hand on the windowpane. He looks up and around himself, at the drab ceiling and the nails sticking up from the floorboards. Silence presses in from all sides. 

Later, he stands out front, hands tucked under his armpits, and watches the last of the trawlers pull themselves in as afternoon sets. He’s tucked at the very end of the shoreline, the flick of the horseshoe that loses itself to the cliffs. He can see the entire stretch of beach, the wharf right in the centre of his vision when he faces the opposite cliff. A light mist of rain has started to flutter downward, and those foggy clouds that hung across the mountains have met the sea. 

Harry stands under them until his lashes go sticky, staring out in the open water. Nothing else in sight. 

-

The rain hasn’t lifted by the following afternoon.

He’d not slept easily, kept awake by the house shaking when the wind curled around the cliffside and struck it head-on, diffusing around the sides. The windows, he’s realized now, have no curtains, so foggy moonlight dipped the entirely of upstairs in navy darkness, and the silver of it was a cold, metallic thing, pressed against his ankles and his cheeks, poking playful fingers through the holes in the quilt. Late morning has drifted into late afternoon, and Harry is still tucked in bed against the cold.

There’s a crack somewhere, an open slither, that’s been letting in air all night. He’d heard the whistle of it, a hollow, breathy thing, high-pitched and echoing up the stairs and keeping him tauntingly awake, shivering. Now, with the hole-ridden quilt thrown over his lap, and a pillow tucked against his chest, coat draped over his shoulders, he sits shaky in the sheets with a book open. The bed is right below the window, sun-shot fog piercing his vision through the muck of rain. 

He’s reading, attempting to, an effort to distract himself from the gaping quiet that’s opened around him despite the constant rattle of the house and the lull of the waves. It’s static and still enough that he’s overtly aware of his own shallow breathing, of the rough fabric of his pants, the place where his thumbs tap absently against the pages. The sheer quiet of it all is almost overbearing, and he finds himself pausing and looking around the room, staring at the empty chair across from him for minutes at a time, lost in his head, before he turns back to the book and attempts to read the same paragraph again.

_A burdensome silence followed, Ivich sat without a word, aloof and insistent, and no one wanted to talk. A miniature local sky had gathered above their heads, a dry and stifling–_

His gaze slowly draws away, back across the room, to the empty furniture and shelves, wind howling.

_A burdensome silence followed, Ivich sat without a word, aloof and insistent, and no one wanted to–_

He glances up, quick.

_A burdensome–_

Again.

_A burdensome–_

Again.

_A–_

He puts the book down, puts his fingers to his lids instead and takes in a shuddery, deep breath. He rubs against the swell he finds there, surging upward like a wave and threatening to spill, to mottle the unfamiliar ink of the pages, and just for a moment, he allows himself to yearn for the soft give of _Persuasion_ or _Wuthering Heights_ , stomach curdling at the dark book in his lap, dust clogged and unused. 

-

He goes to a bar.

He doesn’t know why. He orders a whiskey, neat, and he doesn’t know why. He’s never ordered a whisky neat before – he’s never ordered a drink before – but he feels like he should, should hold something that’s honey-toned like gold, tucked in the corner by himself and picking at the chips in the varnish distractedly, trying to find the trace of the thought that told him to stretch his thin, shaking legs and walk through the rain to this spot. The muted crack of cues feels far away despite the claustrophobic size of the room. At the other end of the bar, chugging sweating bottles of _Alexander Keith’s_ , two men speak in quietly, still in their coats from the mornings fish. Harry blinks at it all and takes a sip of his whiskey.

It’s dreadful. He orders another. 

Continuously, he makes stilted eye contact with the bartender, a tall, thick-limbed man with pale eyes and heavy, swollen lids, nails cut down to dirty stumps, the skin of his ears and neck red and sand-scraped, who refuses to meet his eye purposely when he refills Harry’s glass. Everything smells of salt and wood and sticky-wet. Harry’s eyes are drooping, things turning muddled and amber-shadowed. It’s with a slow blink he realizes he hasn’t today, and the alcohol is shooting through him, into his stomach and his brain, slumping him forward. 

The jukebox in the opposite corner flickers, the record inside changing over, and with the first new notes that rings out, Harry traps the quiet whine that’s bubbled in the back of his throat with firm lips. It’s Santo & Johnny, he’s sure, would know the float of that sound anywhere. His eyes are wet before he registers the sensation, the haze of his vision slipping away into someplace distant, the summertime in New York, sweating, the white-hot glaze of sunlight through the window, burning fever and damp washcloths and torn pages and records filling the silence. Then further, to England, to Crosby and simpler things, boyhood things. 

He’s staring into the dark, glossy shine of his glass when the door opens, bringing with it a burst of silver and blue, an instant chill that ices over the dew in his eyes and locks his ankles together. It breaks him away from that place he’s not allowed himself to go for the longest time, and the shudder of pulling himself away sends a prickling sensation down the length of his spine, stomach curling. Subtly, he wipes at his eyes and pushes his empty glass away with the tips of his shaky fingers. The bartender is watching him again, and the new men at the bar are loud and dripping with ocean stench. Harry looks up at them cautiously, aware of his hunched shoulders, the way his chest is practically stuck to the bar top.

When they sneer down at him, he pays and leaves with his hands dug deep in his coat pockets, swallowing against the swelling glands of his throat, the echo of guitar on his heels.

-

It takes three days for him to finally crack.

Each morning, he wakes from the dark swell of a murky, chilling dream at five-thirty, a routine time that he doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to shake, his hands reaching automatically for the bedside table that isn’t there, left blinking slow and mused until his surroundings clear and a cold whistle circles his exposed wrists. Despite his early starts, Cape Breton is already one step ahead of him when he huddles himself into his coat and tugs the squeaking door of the house open, gusts of wind sneaking under his lapels and snaking up his legs. The frontline houses are all lit up, ebbing candle-light and kitchen bulbs of soft orange, and behind them, the hum of the little town is wide awake, the depths of the mountain side whistling a low pulse, wind with its fingers tucked over the tops of the hills and peeking curious eyes over the mounds, contemplating whether to rush itself forward. 

He walks out to the water’s edge, casting a gaze up to where the wharf is already empty of boats, the fishermen one further step ahead than Cape Breton and Harry both. 

This early, the weak eggshell of the sun is a shy crack on the horizon, oozing clear, gooey whites and pale yellows, the waves surging up with each fuzzy set and swallowing dawn down before it peaks gently over the foam again, skimming soft and grey-blue along the tops of the swell. The gentle murmur of a world awake is folded under tiny barrels of water, and Harry feels a shaking pulse in his fingertips, heart pressed against the back of his ribcage, already feeling so far behind as he blinks blearily against sweeps of sand and prickly gusts. 

In New Brunswick, he’d lasted a week burning coffee beans before having a mug thrown at his head, scampering through the back door of the little hole in the wall place he’d managed to squeeze himself into, though the manager there had never taken her eyes off him for a second, watching him with palpable scrutiny, the shake in his hands and the wonky swirls and hearts he’d tried to make out of milky foam, spilling cacao and burning himself with hot water, eyes all misty and pathetic. Before that it’d been a few places in Maine, odd jobs that he’d never done before, that he’d never thought of doing, all of them ending, one way or another, with a tiny paycheck of a week and a motion to move along. 

Standing in the wet sand now, a lone speck on the beach, the guilty aimlessness that soaks through him makes him want to cry, frustrated and desperate and looking behind him, back to the broken stoop, expecting to see a figure there, hunched and curled in, needing him and only him. Purpose. That’s what he’s searching for, maybe, that’s what he’s convinced himself of trying to find, or a way to draw his mind so far away from itself that he can’t possibly get lost in the thoughts circling like water down a drain, ghoulish and dirty and pale, sucking him _down-down-down_ the more he thinks about everything. 

On the fourth afternoon, Harry is waiting on the wharf when the trawlers come back. He stands with his hands in his pockets, nails dug into his thumbs and tearing at the skin there while the boats dock. Afternoon has settled in a wintry blur, and the ocean is a flurry of white caps and swooping gulls, looming and lingering and looking for scraps to tear apart. With dull _thunks_ the hulls bump against the wooden wharf, men crawling out of their boats like jolly sea monsters, dripping wet and wiry cheeked, veins shot stark blue, lips cracked dry, singing and swearing to the heavens, all boisture and irony and a family-like familiarity that presses alienation in on all sides around Harry’s shuddery, cold body before he even opens his mouth. 

Nets are pulled up, and with it comes a putrid haze of fish and seaweed, boots and coats covered in slime and algae and chum, rubber soles stained watery red and pearly white, fish scales stuck along the sides. They ignore his presence completely, draining out blood-tinted water and lifting ice filled buckets of rigid fish from their boats. He almost walks away, the wet cloy of sea-smell coating the insides of his nose, but his hands are shaking and his knees feel on the verge of collapse, and he’s afraid that if he tries to retreat now he’ll topple straight into the gurgling water.

“Excuse me,” he says, wincing at how overtly polite and British he sounds. Unsurprisingly, the fishermen pay him no attention, slippery coats squeaking as they walk back and forth between their boats, feet thumping along the stained piers. “Um. Excuse me.” 

Finally, a man looks up. He’s tall, taller than Harry it seems, even from his place on the deck of the boat below, labelled a rusty red _Mary-Rose_. His hair is so pale it looks almost a silvery-white, the hazel of his eyes bloodshot and lined with salt-crusted wrinkles, those same lines running along his forehead and framing the now amused curl of his mouth as he hauls himself up onto the wharf, whiskered cheeks twitching. 

“What’re you sayin’?” he says. Harry blinks.

“I was, um,” he fumbles for words, and in the awkward pause that follows, his brain scattering, the men on the boat have all turned to him, staring with their lips tucked into their teeth. Harry’s neck feels too warm. He holds out his hand to shake. “I was wondering if you had any room on your boats?” 

“Room for what?” the man asks bluntly. “What you good for, skip?” 

“Easy, Sully,” another man says as he passes, whistling a low trill.

Again, Harry blinks, slower. “Room for me? I was hoping I could help out.”

The man, Sully, crosses his arms and grins wide, soft laughter puffing up from around them, men rolling their eyes and nudging into Harry’s body as they pass, hauling buckets and huge twists of rope. Harry shrinks a little, his hand still awkwardly outstretched between them, shaky now. Gingerly, he curls his fingers in and tucks his hand back into his coat, looking up at Sully with a cold sludge in his throat. 

“You ever been on a trawler, b’y?” Sully says. Harry shakes his head. “You ever gut a haddock?”

“Looks like he’d have a right sook if he ever gut a haddock,” a man leers, arms folded along the wharf, leaning up below from the _Mary-Rose_. “Probably go ass over, tell you right fuckin’ now.”

There’s another burst of laughter, the man below huffing the last words on a chuckle. Harry swallows against the weight that’s beginning to balloon in his chest, breaths coming out shorter and shorter with every pair of eyes that turn to him. 

“Look, kid,” Sully says, and Harry stares down at his toes, heat flaring his cheeks, fingers curling into fists in his pocket. “You’d do me no good but to weigh down the nets.”

Harry says nothing, just nods and swallows again, ribs creaking under the pressure, under the scald of all the eyes watching him, so obviously out of place. He doesn’t really know what he expected, and quite honestly, he’d of been surprised if they’d let him set foot on their decks, but he flounders as he backs away, the rattling, gutting feeling that’s swooping through his stomach enough to make him nearly curl over and empty it on the splintering wood. 

“Don’t you worry,” Sully says suddenly, brightly, ducking in and wrapping a firm arm around Harry’s shoulder, jostling him. Instinctively Harry shrinks from the touch, but he ends up stooped lower, frame crunched inwards by the strong curl of Sully’s arm. He smells of fish and seawater and Harry blinks up at him wildly, at the manic grin that’s now shining his eyes. “I know the perfect spot for y’, right down them stairs, there.” 

“Oh, _Jesus_ ,” the man from below groans, unfolding his arms and joining them on deck. “Not _Arlo_.” 

“Hey now, nothing wrong with little _Arlo_.” Sully shakes Harry in his hold, overly saccharine. “Perfect Cape Islander for our kid, here.” 

Harry has no time to protest as Sully begins to lead them along the wharf, a few men lingering behind with sticky, mirthful smiles, already holding in their laughter. Harry jolts along in an attempt to keep in step with Sully’s heavy strides, more so stumbling than walking as he’s dragged down four steep, rotting stairs and onto a thin connecting pier, just one small, sleeping boat tied to its edge. _Arlo_ is printed on its bow in sleek, chipped black, and rust clings along the spray rail and much of the body. It’s a pale blue thing, all old, messy paint, half the size of the other trawlers. Sully bangs his fist against the side, leaning over the water with Harry still in his grip, whose stomach lurches as he’s suddenly half hung over the spray of waves. 

“ _Oi!_ ” Sully calls as he straightens, the men behind them all following, their voices squawking loud and obnoxious like the gulls still flying overhead. 

After a pause, a man emerges from under the shelter quietly, eyes already full of a reserved dread when he shields them with his hand, peering up.

“What do you want, Sullivan?” he sighs.

“Fresh blood for you, Tomlinson,” Sully says. Then, without preamble, he shoves Harry forward and into the boat. 

The pier is small and lower than the rest of the wharf, but there’s still a drop between it and _Arlo_ , and Harry’s heart rises into the back of his throat as he falls, letting out a quiet yelp of alarm when his feet slip, ocean spray reaching for him. The man catches him unsteadily, both of them almost careening backwards into the port side. Harry’s cheeks flare up immediately. There’s a frantic, garbled apology on the tip of his tongue, but the intensity in the man’s glare when he pulls back is enough to let the words die away. 

He’s simmering and still, daggers shot upwards at the other fishermen. On his left cheek, a scar pulls down his skin in a pink, fleshy line that starts just below his eye, like a fishhook has caught itself there, and the scraggly rough of his long beard is copper toned and dark auburn, missing that silver wire. He’s all rubber and salt-cracked and blue veined, all pale icy eyes full of hostility as he shoves Harry away, flicking a steely gaze to him just for a moment. 

“You’ll fit right in on this one, Brit,” Sully winks, and Harry curls his arms around his stomach, the boat rocking beneath them. “No place on our boats. Thought it was about time you expand your one man crew, Tomlinson.”

“Fuck off,” the man says calmly, low. 

“Alright, alright,” Sully whistles, holding up his hands as he backs away, fighting laughter. “Better keep your eye out, skip.”

Harry flushes again, left shivering and trapped in the boat of a man he’s never met, radiating such bitter hostility that Harry feels uncomfortable standing this close. The man stares down at his toes, jaw clenched and twitching, before he breathes out slowly and scratches at his beard, finally turning to Harry, the fiery look that’d iced his eyes gone softer, gone exhausted. 

“I’m terribly sorry,” Harry babbles, already stumbling across the deck to the pier. It hurts to breathe. “I really didn’t mean for–”

“It’s fine,” the man sighs. He reaches for the ropes along the pier, untying them and beginning to loop them into tight bundles, blinking heavily. 

“Um,” Harry says, fingers curled tight over the slippery edge of the boat, because the space between it and the pier is slowly increasing with each ebb of the waves, his torso stretching as he hangs on. “What are you–. Are you going out now?”

“I always go out in the afternoon,” the man replies, nothing more. At Harry’s expression, he raises a lazy eyebrow. “What, not so keen on the whole boat thing, now?”

Harry feels ill when he looks down at the churning water. This wasn’t a good idea, not at all. They’re still inshore but he’s already feeling queasy, his body coming down from the shock of the last fifteen minutes, fingers frozen and numb, the tip of his nose an ice block. He’d barely managed the ferry ride over, and as the wharf becomes smaller and smaller, and their surrounds become vaster and bluer and rougher, he feels a very real pulse of hot, sticky panic roll through his stomach. 

“Make yourself useful, then,” the man says, untangling his nets. “Grab me the otter boards.” 

Harry remains frozen, looking helplessly around the tiny vessel. His eyes are stinging, another flurry of embarrassment curling around his hips. After a minute of stillness, the man turns to face him, an agitated tick to his jaw that has Harry shrinking in on himself, breaking his gaze away because the intensity of that stare is too much for him to be able to meet. 

“What?” the man snaps. “Hurry up.” 

“I don’t–.” Harry huffs helplessly, refusing to let the stinging in his eyes turn into a swell. “I don’t know what an otter board _is_.” 

The man stares at him. “What do you mean?”

“I’ve never been on a boat before,” Harry says. “Just the ferry over here.”

“The ferry–” the man cuts himself off and pinches the bridge of his nose, hands on his hips, raincoat squeaking with the movement. He closes his eyes. “What in the _hell_ were doing on the wharf, then? Where are you even from?”

“New York,” Harry says softly, fingers wrung together.

“You don’t sound like any fuckin’ New Yorker I’ve ever heard,” the man says. 

The boat rocks, dipping down at long, drawn out wave, and Harry grips the side of it, hand curled over his stomach. When the water hits the hull foam sprays upward and into his eyes, onto his cheeks, and there’s a thin film of shiny salt over his lids, in his eyes that he tries to blink away, looking down into the swirling navy of the sea because he can’t look up. 

“Can you bleed a fish?” the man asks, and Harry shakes his head, lips pulled into his mouth. “Can you tie a fucking _knot?_ ” 

“No,” Harry answers, tight and stricken, the smell of chum and fish polluting everything, his queasiness crawling slow and steady up into his throat. 

“What’s your name?” the man says impatiently. 

“Harry.” Another wave bursts upward, and he stumbles sideways a little, chest heaving.

“I’m Louis,” the man says, watching him. He rolls his eyes to the sky. “Jesus Christ, just sit down before you keel over, alright?” 

Harry does sit, arms wrapped loosely around his stomach under the shelter. Louis works in silence, and the air between them is practically electric, frustration radiating from both of them, though it’s more helplessness on Harry’s part, an awful, flushing embarrassment that hasn’t left the comfort of his ears and neck since he stepped foot onto the wharf. He can’t tell if it’s raining or if the ocean spray is just at a constant flurry, but he becomes shivering and blue-veined too quickly, the ends of his hair wet and dripping in his eyes. His clothes are uncomfortably damp. 

Louis seems to notice this eventually. When he turns he lets out a ragged huff, shaking his head. “You haven’t even got a proper coat,” he says. “Some plan you got yourself, kid.” 

“Don’t call me that,” Harry snaps, and Louis blinks, seeming taken aback by the sudden bite that curls around the words. Harry shrinks into himself, too, closing his eyes so they don’t spill. He hates that more than anything, the patronizing jeer of it, the way he’s belittled and made to be small when nobody knows he never got to be anything other than bigger than the things that surrounded him. 

A steely silence settles over the little boat, wind howling. Harry stares at his knees and curls his body further into itself. Wordlessly, Louis shucks his coat and hands it over. It’s too small but Harry squeezes into it without complaint, misty eyed and avoiding the way Louis is still staring at him, hands half raised like he’s trying not to spook a wild animal. 

“How’d you manage to get yourself all the way out here?” he asks eventually. 

Harry says nothing, silently fuming, just shrugs and keeps his damp eyes on his damp knees. 

The sun is setting when they pull back into the harbour. Buttery yellow light glows in auras around the clouds, drifting out over the water and taking the rain with them, leaving the land dry for now. A dark haze is edging on the horizon, signaling the beginning of a slow dusk, and when Louis ties the boat to the edge of the pier, Harry still sitting under the shelter, they’ve not exchanged another word. 

Harry wobbles up onto the pier, the tightness of Louis’ coat cutting into his arms as he reaches for the ladder. The wharf is silent at this time of day, and Harry’s never been close enough to feel the emptiness of it, almost ghostly, the distant scream of the wind out on the far sea echoing like a siren song back to them. He watches as Louis packs everything away, hauls up his buckets, scratches his fingers through his beard. Finally, he joins Harry on the pier. Harry stares at his scar, the fleshy pink of it, the places where the skin has healed itself in a bumpy line, half-covered by the wild, coarse hairs of his beard. 

They stand there for a pregnant, awkward beat, watching each other, observing. Then, with a quiet, tired sigh, Louis says, “Go back home, kid. Wherever that is.” 

Harry bristles. With less grace than he’d like, he shucks the tight, dripping coat and shoves it roughly into Louis’ chest, hot flames of embarrassment licking his cheeks. He can feels Louis’ gaze following him as he storms up to the wharf, and he huddles into himself, eyes burning something fierce as he trudges through the sand and back to the little house. 

Instantly he feels swallowed by it, and when the door slams closed behind him, he leans against it and ducks his head, pushes his thumb and forefinger into his eyes to stop the tears threatening to spill. He allows himself one ragged, broken breath, before he knocks his head back against the door and looks at the dull ceiling, the weight in his chest tugging everything down until it feels like he’s sinking through the floor, until his shoulders ache and he stumbles upstairs into bed, his hair and skin still damp, tangled with salt water, the peeled skin of his fingers stinging and raw. 

-

It’s begun to snow. 

Things are a gentle, speckled flurry, but he still hasn’t managed to find the gap-toothed whistle, and a mist of chilled, prickly air is cuffed around his ankles. It makes his steps heavier, clunkier, a little unsteady as he stands by the stove, rests his fingers by the burners, close enough to be on the verge of too-hot but not close enough to hurt, and watches the water bubble. The book is open beside him, pages held spread by a wooden, dirt clogged door stopper that he’d found under the bed, the tail end of it chipped off. His pointer finger is still swollen from the splinter it had jabbed him with when he’d curled his hands around it. 

_A life. He looked at all those empurpled visages, those russet moons that slid across the cushionings of cloud. ‘They have lives. All of them. Each his own. Lives that reach through the walls of the dancing-hall, along the streets of Paris, across France, they interlace and intersect, and they remain as vigorously personal as a tooth-brush, a razor, and toilet objects that are never loaned.’_

The pot gurgles, little spitfires of boiling water shooting outward and landing on the browned pages, dotting his jacket. It soaks into the ink and blurs it together slowly. _Russet moons_ becomes one word, _walls_ becomes translucent, and Harry slowly turns the heat down, the edges of his fingernails buzzing from the feel of it. 

_‘I knew. I knew that they each had their life. And I knew that I had one too. I had begun to think: I do nothing, I shall escape. And now I’m bloody well in the thick of it.’ He laid the knife on the table, took the bottle, and tipped it over his glass: it was empty. There was little champagne in Ivich’s glass, he picked up the glass and drank._

Sitting at the wonky table, one of the legs shorter than the other three, the length of the window bathes him in blue and crystal whites, in wet sludge and silver stickiness. Steam rises scalding off the dull plate, and he breathes it in then out again, feels it turn from fire to frost between his teeth. The vegetables are mush, burning hot in the pockets of his cheeks. He keeps his lips parted and the frost kisses his chin. 

_‘I have led a toothless life,’ he thought. ‘A toothless life. I have never bitten into anything.’_

The snow is a wet, syncopated _tick-tick_. He looks up, looks along the broken grains of the table to the empty chair across from him. 

_I have never bitten into–_

The frost draws itself away, curls blue and hollow and disrupts the dust on the chair.

_I have never bitten–_

He glances up again.

_I have never–_

Again.

_I have never–_

He closes the book. 

-

“I’ll have, um. Whiskey, neat,” Harry says. “Please.” 

The barman laughs under his breath and slides the glass along the sticky varnish. 

He’s curled himself in the corner again, stuck along the side of the wall so he has something to ground himself to. There’s snow dusting his hair and his lashes. The fall of it has turned from that soft flurry into a whip, almost the same as that first day on the water, pulling itself along the cliffside with smooth, full-bodied curves. He feels alien sitting here with his shoulders hunched in, but staying in the house was starting to make his fingers itch, all the empty shelves and the settled dust sparking him with the insatiable need to upend every piece of furniture, open every cupboard, and search desperately for something he’ll never be able to find. 

Santo & Johnny is playing again, the same album spinning slow and hazy as the last time. It lulls everything into a summery bubble that exists only here, in the orange fog of the barlights and the dampness that hugs the corners of the room and the red, ripped velvet, in the dewy wet of his cheeks when he tugs his coat up higher over his shoulders to avoid the pointed, hostile gazes of the men from across the room, their cues a threatening _crack._

Harry has finished three glasses when the door opens, a blast of blue pin-needles scuttling along the floor and latching onto his ankles and neck, the sunset colours gone a polarizing white. It closes again with a stilted _whoomph_ , and then winter is gone again, and it’s just them trapped in this glass jar. 

“Evening, Fergus,” a voice says, low and tired, a little lilted as the shadow of a figure pulls out a seat. 

Harry turns his head slightly, still hunched over his glass. Louis slips into the stool four spaces down, and the barman, Fergus, pours him a drink without meeting his eye, something dark and sticky and strong looking that Harry can smell the moment it oozes into the glass. Louis finishes half of it in one painful looking sip. The residue shines his top lip and the edges of his beard, and as he wipes it away he reaches into the pocket of his coat, a worn, fuzzy paperback finding its place in his thin fingers.

The back cover is half torn off. It’s William Golding, _The Spire_. He doesn’t acknowledge the presence of Harry or anyone else, just keeps his lips leant against the rim of the glass, his drink in one hand and his book held open with his thumb in the other, turning the page every now and then with a dainty finger. 

Harry doesn’t mean to stare. For the most part, he keeps his eyes on the liquid in his own glass, swirling it aimlessly and trying to breathe through every wobbly note of _You Belong To Me,_ a gooey warmth behind his ears and his eyes. But then Louis flicks a page, just a soft flutter of a thing, and Harry glances up at him. The bar light shines his scar honey-slick, that same shine catching the edges of his beard when he shifts, the very tips of his lashes. In the corners of his eyes exhaustion lingers, and each breath raises his chest in a stuttered motion, blinking heavy. 

Here, Harry finds himself in that place he so often finds himself in now, wanting to somehow or someway say the simplest _hello_ , and finding the word stuck deep in his chest. He can’t bring it up, no matter how long his sips are, no matter how long he holds his breath for in the hope it’ll crawl up his throat and escape for air. Louis radiates that same hostility that Harry had felt out on the little boat, and it feels like just the two of them sitting in here, so completely separated but somehow managing to gravitate on the same warped plane as each other. 

Louis still hasn’t looked up, and Harry still hasn’t spluttered his words when the door opens again to re-introduce winter. It’s so bitingly cold that Harry has to close his eyes, nose buried in his glass, in the gross warmth of whiskey. 

“Skipper!” A freezing palm cups the back of his neck. He instantly curls away. Fergus nods to all the men in greeting, voices breaking the quiet lull. _Long Walk Home_ disappears underneath it all, and the hand grips tighter, shaking him slightly. “What’re you sayin’?” 

Harry glowers into his glass and remains silent. It’s then that Sully notices Louis a few stools down, amused laughter curling his mouth up in something wicked. 

“Well,” he says, gesturing to the space between them. “You two make a curious pair, huh?” 

“I’m reading, Sullivan,” Louis sighs out in disinterest and waves him off, eyes not leaving the page. 

A chill has settled along Harry’s spine, lungs fluttering oddly in his ribs. Sully claps him roughly on the back and rests his now fisted hands against his hips, seeming to survey them both, still smiling.

“Surprised you survived,” he says, nudging Harry lightly with his elbow. Then, he shields his mouth with the back of his hand and leans in close, eyes flashing as he whispers, “You must be one of the lucky ones.” 

His smile is sticky and manic, and something disgusting curls in Harry’s stomach at the way Louis finally looks up, steely and harsh and burning, a flicker of alarm underneath it all. 

“I’d happily take you out and drop you off, Sullivan,” he bites out, and the whole bar goes silent, eyes watching. Louis’ chest shudders afterwards, blinking as he retracts into himself, like he hadn’t meant for the words to be let go. Harry wonders how long he was holding his breath for them to explode like that. His own _hello_ is still clawing desperately at his ribs. 

The pause is pregnant, electric, full of static and something that Harry can’t pin down. But it’s there, so palpable and present and daunting, resting in the eyes of every person in the bar, all drawn to Louis, pinning him down with their gazes. Orange glow has him caught in a silhouette, a warped spotlight, and Harry holds his breath against the hands pushing down on his lungs. There’s something here, something unspoken, that taints the air and makes it unbearable. 

“Don’t we all know it,” Sully murmurs, softly challenging as he trails away to the other side of the room.

Louis knocks back the rest of his drink and slams his glass down. It sounds too much now that eerie silence has settled, and the music feels both too slow and too fast, a failing mechanical ride that’s gone grating against the ear. Harry watches with wide eyes as Louis shoves past the men that purposely block his path, muttering something that sounds distinctly like _fucking cunt_ under his breath as he wrenches the door open. Winter comes in a dangerous blast; summer scoops them up again. 

Harry follows minutes later, when he doesn’t feel underwater anymore and the volume of the bar has returned to normal, glasses clinking softly, air no longer choked with tension. The snow has turned to a thin sleet that curls the edges of his hair immediately, breath coming out in glossy bundles of grey and white, tinged yellow when he passes under a foggy lamp. Louis stands under one a few places down, the white of his breath tinged with smoke. The tiny cherry of his cigarette is a firefly trapped in a shaking snow globe. 

As Harry approaches, the _hello_ that’s started to tear a hole in his side scratches instantly. He wants to say _are you alright_ or _is everything okay_ or _what was that about_ but that feels too daft and too much, something that Harry would shy away from if he was asked. So when he reaches Louis’ side, hoping to at least exhale his _hello,_ nothing comes. Louis glances up at him, book tucked under his arm, hair hanging wet and miserable in his guarded eyes, and says nothing in return. It’s silent save for the mix of snow and rain and their shivering limbs. They just watch each other, and Harry thinks _I’m sorry_ but he doesn’t know why, he just knows that he is, that he’s been soaking up emotion like a dirty, empathetic sponge for so long and standing here in foreign snow weighs his heart with something dreadful.

Louis blows a steady stream of smoke against Harry’s chest, and when it wafts up between them their gazes blur and go hazy. Then he’s walking away, out of the lamplight with his shoulders slumped until he’s just a smudged shadow, blending in with the rain until there’s nothing else to blend and only the sleet is left. Harry stands there for longer than he really needs to, overcome with maudlin. 

-

When he wakes, it’s to a dull, hollow _thunk._

Pulled from the dregs of a nauseating, hazy dream, he’s dragged back through the sticky mud of years passed, and he’s shooting up and out of bed before he’s fully conscious, a cold honey sticking along the back of his neck and beading down his spine, fingers full of fuzz. Before he registers what he’s doing, he’s reaching for the medication that isn’t there, reaching for shoes and water and the telephone because there’s another dull _thunk_ and it’s mum and she needs him and she’s here and he has to– 

Another rock ricochets off the window. Harry flinches away from it so suddenly that he half stumbles over the armchair behind him, landing painfully on his tailbone, elbows vibrating with the force of catching his awkward fall. Blinking against the shadowy dew of morning, through the mist of dawn at four-thirty a small pebble hurls itself out of the shadows, and Harry flinches again when it does, pinging off the window. It takes with it a chip of glass. 

Harry takes the stairs on light, cautious feet, but his quiet is broken by the obnoxious groan of the front door when he tugs it open. Immediately, cold air snakes around him, curling up the thin fabric of his too-small pajamas and licking at the joints of his knees, between his ribs, the dips of his collarbones. 

Louis is standing on the beach, dressed entirely in rubber and wool with another slippery coat over his arm. When he spots Harry, he gently tosses the tiny handful of rocks in his palm onto the wet sand. There’s movement on the wharf already but the sun is nowhere to be seen. Just a dull, ebbing navy that’ll soon tint white glosses the horizon.

“What are you doing?” Harry hisses, tucking his arms into himself, cheeks flushed from the cold. He’s still trying to figure out if he’s fully awake or not, but that’s definitely Louis standing among the sand, looking sullen and quiet and impatient. 

Louis starts forward and holds out the coat. Harry steps back behind the cover of his door, teeth rattling. They rest in a stalemate for a few minutes, until Louis sighs and treads softly up to the stoop, still not climbing up the broken stairs it takes to meet Harry by the door.

“You’re late,” is all he says. Harry blinks against the chill that’s icing over his eyes.

“For what?” he says. 

Louis just tosses the coat at him, and Harry fumbles, numb fingers slipping over the damp rubber. Louis somehow looks insistent but apprehensive all at once, defiant and steely-eyed and hostile, but weary, too. 

“Just get dressed,” he says, digging his hands into his pockets and looking away, out towards the wharf. “And be quick about it, or they’ll take my trawls.”

When Harry stumbles out onto the beach ten minutes later, he’s still frozen down to his bones and wading through the last remnants of his dream, blinking against the grainy wind. He follows Louis wordlessly to the wharf, trying to keep up with the pace he sets as damp sand flicks up against the backs of his legs, coat squeaking and rubbing awkwardly at his underarms, bright yellow and stained with God knows what, fish innards or blood or muck. The waves are hollow and thin this morning, like the earlier snow has calmed the frantic pulse of the sea, and the sun is coming up now in a tentative yellow, a heavy, sleep-filled blink. 

Louis flips up the hood of his coat when they step onto the wharf. The moment they start to walk alongside the trawlers, it goes deathly silent, fishermen taking their time to pause and sneer and bump their shoulders as they walk past. Harry keeps his eyes down, inhaling smoke now, a thin trail that Louis guides him with as they drop down onto the lower pier and start towards a frail looking _Arlo_. 

Harry huddles under the little shelter anxiously while Louis finishes off his cigarette up on the pier. With his face obscured by his hood, Harry can only see the wiry scruff of his beard and the tip of his nose, the gentle purse of his lips when he exhales a long gust and finally stamps the bud out with his foot. 

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” Harry reminds him gingerly as he drops down into the boat, already untying the ropes. 

“Then don’t do anything,” Louis says blankly, without looking up, knotting the rope and shoving it awkwardly into a splintering side compartment.

They set off in a silence so uncomfortable that the coat stretched over Harry’s chest feels as though it’s about to cut off his circulation. The waves aren’t as rough as they were yesterday, but he can hardly appreciate the blue-grey ribbons of sunrise with the water churning in the same rhythm as his stomach. Louis seems to struggle a little with settling the trawls himself, obviously a job not meant for one person even in such a small boat, but Harry remains stubbornly silent, still hanging onto the last morsels of bitterness from their first meeting, and onto the breathless tension from the night before. 

Instead of speaking he closes his eyes against the nausea that settles hot and too warm in his blood, then opens them again when he finds that the act of shutting them in the first place makes the rolling in his stomach so much worse. There seems to be no happy medium, only the weight of something dark blue that hasn’t left his chest for weeks, and the dangerous heave of his organs threatening to burst. 

Of course, the facade of a calm day and soft sunshine doesn’t last, and it starts to rain after Louis pulls in his first empty trawl. Thick, grey clouds are dragging across the open blue, hanging low enough to touch. Harry is shaking and huddled beneath the shelter with his hood up, tiny bullets of water dripping onto his nose and cheeks, lashes clumping together and turning his vision blurry. Louis is silent and steely and repetitive in his movements, not turning to face Harry the entire time, just resets his trawls and swears under his breath when he pulls them up empty, jaw twitching, hair plastered to his forehead. 

Around them, the sea is an empty, swaying field. None of the other trawlers are in sight, not even in distant silhouette. There’s only a tiny red buoy that’s a mere speck and an intermittent group of squawking gulls to keep them company. It feels like hours before Louis pulls up the last trawl and kicks the net aside, grey gloom hovering over the shadow of Cape Breton now, rain gone misty and light. 

Louis doesn’t look at him once when he steers them back to the wharf. The trawlers aren’t back yet, so it’s just them bobbing alone up to the wooden planks, the only sound being children’s voices on the beach, carried by the wind, and the slow hum of the little town waking up. Harry blinks against the mist tiredly. Morning has only just broken but his bones feel weary and full of dust. He wants to sleep, possibly forever. 

It’s an effort for him to shuck the coat, shoulders heavy and lead-filled, but when he holds it out Louis just stares at him, still tying _Arlo_ back to the pier.

“Keep it,” he says, turning away in an obvious dismissal and climbing out of the boat, digging around in his pockets until he finds his cigarettes and his lighter. 

Harry’s chest stutters, fingers curled around the slippery material, so obnoxiously yellow and bright against the pale, dull blues and greys that surround them. 

“Don’t be late tomorrow,” Louis says. Smoke trails behind him as he leaves, boots clunking on the wood. 

Harry just blinks after him, hundreds of questions trapped in his chest that are fighting to break free. He stays huddled under the shelter, frozen, watching Louis as he goes. _Arlo_ is nudging the pier gently, and Harry’s hip nudges against its side just as soft, the rhythm lulling him as he turns back out to the water, squinting against the bleary rings of sunlight that dot his vision. 

-

By the end of the week, the foggy window above his bed is scratched and chipped. Harry wakes with a tinnitus fuzz caressing his ears, limbs so heavy they feel like a cold damp seeping into damper sheets, and when he finally manages to nose his way out of the cream blankets, lashes clumped together with gunk and the residue of dream-tears, Cape Breton’s clock is ticking its sharp nails against his skull. 

Louis never knocks. He’s always waiting on the beach, often smoking, grey haze mixing with the seafoam and the rain, hood of his coat tucked over his head, scowling at the sand while Harry attempts to dress himself whilst still half-asleep, while he attempts to navigate the emptiness of the house, attempts to restrain the routine of reaching for a dresser and a nightstand and reaching for a shoulder that’s no longer there. 

Most days, they remain entirely silent for the whole morning, not a word spoken between them. Their companionship is awkward and tinged with a hesitance that Harry feels he could almost sift his fingers through. No questions pass between them, no idle small talk, no greetings or goodbyes. It’s just more quiet, more stillness building upon the frozen glaze that’s become a constant visor over his life for so long. 

But, it is a normality. A new routine for him to latch on to that he didn’t have before. That, at least, is something. 

Laced in the overbearing silence is a heady guilt that Harry can’t quite shake, a remorse that won’t leave him be whenever Louis glances at him. He’s the most intimidating person Harry has ever met – which, on the grand list of people he’s ever interacted with, doesn’t seem much – but the simple act of their eyes meeting has Harry’s ears growing hot and cold. Louis is sharp, piercing, features and posture and movements so striking. Looking at him feels like a challenge, like a test, and Harry hates that, because he knows that Louis notices the way he can barely look him in the eye, the way that Harry ducks his head and swallows audibly. He hates the sighs that constantly spill from Louis’ cracked lips, lost in the wind and the waves, so quiet. He hates that he can’t just be better. 

The mornings go like that. Harry often watches the water with that familiar nausea curling in his stomach, plays with thick, wet rope and scuffs his toes on the deck while Louis struggles with and swears at tangled nets, pulling them up empty. They watch the _Mary-Rose_ and the rest of the trawlers disappear into the distance, far offshore, while _Arlo_ creaks and tries to tug them back to land. Louis will often tie the boat and leave Harry in it, and the time Harry manages to climb out, feet slipping on rain-wet wood, he’s is gone. The hollow feeling in Harry’s chest expands, and then he goes back to the house and sits by the window surrounded by empty furniture until he can scarcely breathe. 

He starts to go walking after the mornings on the boat, sometimes. Tentatively. Cape Breton really is nothing more than it’s seafront and the harbour. Behind the frontline resides only the out of place seafood chains and restaurants, the odd shops for tourists, little hotels with clean bars that are nothing like the mildew, homegrown places that clutter the beach. He only spends twenty minutes inside one of the small diners, surrounded by people distinctly not from the area, until he feels entirely out of his skin, feels like a ghost in a glass bottle being sneered at from across the street. 

The noon time is for sleep so he doesn’t have to think about anything else, the hope that he’ll sleep through the sun setting and well into the night and not have to move to eat or brush the dust away from objects that aren’t there. Some nights he wakes in the pitch darkness with an unnerving itch to crawl out of his own skin and tear up the floorboards, nails buzzing, throat swollen, eyes shaky and wet and lit up in moonlight. On those nights he rises, trembling in the cold that seeps through his thin pajamas, and flicks on the dim, murky light in the kitchen.

There, he attempts to read, to boil water and watch the rust flake in the pots, to breathe through the pain blooming in his chest. 

Absently, he thinks about going back to the bar, and finds that very thought locked in anxious chains. Thus far, his attempts to fit in have only seemed to amplify his ability to always stand out. On the nights he can’t sleep, he flicks on the lights and sits by the window with his guilt drawn around him, a hot mug of water cupped in his thin fingers. There are still no curtains, and sometimes, on the clear nights, the moon is so bright that when he looks out to the water he can see the pearls of the wake, the silver light that cuts through the navy. 

Eventually clouds drift in and shield the moon, or rain will begin to blur the glass of the window, and he’ll go to bed already shaking at the thought of having to wake up, of getting in the boat and filling the silence with plaguing, awful thoughts, watching the water twirl and wishing for the simpler times. 

-

There are some days he wakes with a heart that feels as though it’s bruised black and blue.

It hurts so much just to breathe that he’s immobile from the moment he blinks awake, breathing open mouthed and face-down in the chilled damp of his pillow, the sheets cold along his ears because the whistle of the wind is still cooing around the corners of the house and leaving him frozen. 

Harry opens his eyes on this morning, rocks clicking against the window, and finds that the act of sitting up has him close to tears, trembling as he slowly pulls his body out of an icy cocoon, legs tucked up as he leans awkwardly on his side. His elbows and knees are veiled purple, and he allows himself one stifling, achy breath, still half buried under the sheets, before he forces himself to stand, closing his eyes as he does so.

It’s late when he finally manages to shove the front door open, boots like weights on his feet, the rubber coat feeling even more constricting than usual. He’s in a daze when he hits the sand, an awful, vicious chill curling up of the water and dusting his cheeks. Louis has his arms crossed and his jaw is ticking as he watches Harry approach, hair a mess from the wind and the ocean spray that’s fighting it’s way up the beach. The cliffs are whistling, and over the distant hills black clouds linger and wait.

“Hurry up,” Louis snaps. That’s all he says before he turns and sets a swift pace towards the wharf.

Harry’s eyes feel sunken into his skull. He’s exhausted from feeling nothing and everything constantly, all at once, over and over without any way to escape. It’s all trapped inside, and as he stumbles and staggers in the harsh footsteps Louis leaves in the wet sand, his heart lurches and drops like he’s missed a step on a staircase, a numb and frightening _thud_ against his ribs. 

Their usual silence settles once they’re in the boat, and Harry helps to untie the ropes with shaking fingers, helps push off from the wharf to let the water carry them. He has to rest there for a moment, hands braced on the chilled ledge. He can feel Louis watching him, pale eyes burning the side of his cheek, and it feels uncharacteristically wary and cautious, almost like he’s ready to reach out if Harry topples overboard. It feels like he might, the further they chug out into open water. His limbs are aching. He has an overbearing need to close his eyes and keep them closed.

Seafoam brushes his cheeks but it feels like fingertips, and just for that singular moment he’s six years old and that touch is a whisper of a memory that’s so fuzzy it feels like it’s floating away, slipping from his grasp. He touches his own fingers to his cheeks before he realizes what he’s doing, and they’re stinging like his eyes, wet from the cold and the water. 

 _Arlo_ lingers in the shallows today. Louis keeps watching the clouds over the hills, the teasing sway of them, and they drift in a dreamy sweep over the reef. Despite the coaxing hush of beach waves and the watery yellow that lines the horizon, the dulled nausea inflames itself midway between Harry’s chest and his stomach, sitting as a rueful and cruelly persistent weight. He feels dangerously ill, freezing cold down to his bones, but his muscles and skin are prickling with a sweating heat, a sticky glue-like feeling cradled beneath his eyes and behind his ears. 

Louis seems to notice this too, eventually. He pauses as he starts to reset a trawl, and when he meets Harry’s eyes that earlier caution flares, his thin, scarred fingers stilling around the tangle of the net. Harry’s almost embarrassed by it, and he ducks his gaze, looks at the spot in his pants where a frayed hole is beginning to form by his left knee. He doesn’t know if he detests the pity in Louis’ icy eyes or if he craves it. Caught somewhere in the middle of that dangerous spectrum, he tries to will the thoughts away all together.

“There are books in the cabin, if you’d like,” Louis says with an air of hesitance, fumbling with the net and looking away sharply. Harry simply blinks at him for a moment, unsure if he imagines the echo that carries around them in the wind, the words reverberating outward and upward into what had been a wide, steady silence. 

The cabin is barely that, moreso a tiny rectangular space that he has to duck his entire upper body to reach into, knees knocking against the blue sea-damp cushioning. Tiny shelves are cracked and brimming full, lifejackets, balled up sweaters, frayed ropes and grimy flares, tangled nets and hooks and nondescript junk. Books seem to spill from the gaps at random, deep yellow pages, most with either the covers or the backs torn off, spines cracked and falling to pieces, so clearly clogged with age and seawater and use. Harry reaches for three at random, too queasy to stay bent in this dark space.

Louis is facing out to sea when he reemerges, arms crossed tightly over his chest, hood up, just a smudge of red against the iced, deep blues around them. Harry tucks himself back under the shelter and thumbs at the first book, the cover and spine desolate and illegible. The pages are stiff and bent, some permanently creased and torn from years of being dog-eared, and the ink is faded to nothing in some places, bloated and dark from water in others. 

He finds the first page. _Mother died today. Or, maybe, yesterday; I can’t be sure. The telegram from the–._ He closes the book and immediately tucks it into the tiny compartment beside him, closing his eyes and letting his chest shudder with the icy breath he inhales. The black clouds are drawing near, a dark shadow. He flicks open the next book and begins to read. 

_Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show._

Morning breaks in a veiled grey tremble of light. The silence between them has settled firm again, and the only sound filling the tiny boat is the whispered brush of pages turning, the scrape of the net against the stern and the wet slap of wave, all of it muted by a howling wind. It’s as the first fragile yellow of sunlight starts to ebb amongst blue that Louis pulls up his nets, weighted this time.

Harry glances up at the sound, slippery haddocks withering and jolting against the net. There are three, scales shiny from seawater, gasping mouths trying to escape the tangles, and Louis is quick and nimble with his hands as he pulls them from the net. There’s a bucket of seawater beside him. He grips the first fish, it’s glassy eyes staring right back at Harry from across the boat. Something sickly and cold drips down his spine, and before he can blink Louis is drawing a knife up through its gills, a watery red running in little rivets.

It’s still breathing, still frantically squirming. Louis drops it into the bucket, and the seawater blushes a sticky, dark maroon. 

Harry’s stomach rises into his throat. 

He manages only a choked, shaking _Louis_ before he’s throwing up over the side of the boat, stomach lurching further when _Arlo_ dips and creaks under the weight of his body draped over the starboard side. With each wave the water seems to draw closer, foam spraying into his eyes and his parted, gasping mouth, throat raw and numb with it, retching as the boat dips and he has to vomit again because the weight on his chest is too much, and suddenly it’s difficult to breathe.

“ _Fuck_ ,” he hears Louis say, but it feels like there are cotton balls in his ears and everything is muted and far away. Then there are firm hands gripping his arms and tugging him roughly up and away from the edge of the boat, sending them both stumbling backwards from the inertia of weight shifting, _Arlo_ groaning again. Louis is wide-eyed, pale gaze startled as he lets Harry go, hands raised like he’s ready to catch him if he falls again.

It feels that way. Harry’s chest is still heaving, and he can feel the shaking that’s started in his hands, the slow spread up it up his arms to his shoulders. There’s blood on Louis’ thumbs, and when Harry looks down there are two bruise shaped smudges on the slick yellow of his coat. It’s enough to make the nausea come rolling back through, a hot flush stuck along his neck. 

He looks away from it sharply, out to the ocean, away from the fish that are still writhing in the net, the fish slowly going rigid in the bucket, bleeding out and gasping, gills still working, it’s cold, slimy gaze searching for Harry’s. It’s so entirely hushed now, just their breathing and the lap of waves as sunlight filters downward in soft beams. The whole world is here, spread out before him, so expansive and huge that the limitlessness of it, its infinite nature, turns into the most skintight type of claustrophobia. 

“I’m…” Louis begins, trailing off. Harry crosses his arms over his chest protectively, bringing his gaze back down to his feet. Tears spring into his eyes before he can stop them, and he’s so frustrated and embarrassed and his mouth tastes vile, throat like sandpaper. For a moment, an anger in him rages so fierce that it almost shocks him, and he wants to lash out, wants to question _why_ Louis continues to bring him out onto this abandoned plane, why things sit so heavy between them, why things have turned out this way. 

The wind howls, softer this time, and when he meets Louis’ eye, for that singular moment it feels as though they can see right through each other. 

They head back in. Louis bleeds the last two fish, their gills expanding sporadically, on deck too long to be put back into the water. Harry looks away, curls his knees into his chest and swallows around the prickly lump in his throat every few seconds, nose running. He barely registers the trip in, just stares blankly out to sea and picks at the loose threads on his pants absently, the shaky adrenaline subsiding into dull shock. He keeps seeing it, the haddock’s eyes, the glint of the knife, red water. The feelings of Louis’ hands on him, of another person touching him, _grabbing_ him. When he tries to rub the dark smudges from his coat, the blood has dried and gone crusty, and it flakes onto his hands. 

Louis doesn’t leave him in the boat this time. He helps Harry out silently, leads him with a hesitant palm on his back along the pier, and Harry doesn’t breathe through it all, watching Louis cautiously. They end up in a drab little pub tucked just behind the front line, a square space that’s gloomy and filtered in maroon shadow. There’s one foggy window, a small collection of varnish-sticky tabletops, an Elvis record spinning, and not another person in sight aside from themselves and the waitress behind the bar that’s picking at her nail polish, paying them no mind. 

They both just have water. Harry doesn’t feel like eating and Louis doesn’t order. Tucked into a hole-filled booth, a crippling, awkward silence settled between them, Harry wonders how hard he’d have to wish for the cushions to swallow him up. It’s freezing, and intermittently his eyes begin to sting, the last dregs of fluster and embarrassment still clinging to him. 

“Are you alright?” Louis says eventually, quiet, with an air of generality that Harry appreciates and simultaneously loathes, because he can’t even begin answering that question.   

“Yes,” he says, after a bout of silence, picking at the skin of his thumb, gaze lowered.

Louis just nods and takes a strained sip of his water. Harry can feel him staring, and eventually he has to look up because his cheeks are hot. When he does, his throat tightens. Even in this dreary, dark light Louis’ eyes are sharp and bright, pale in comparison to the sunspots on his face and the deep russet tones of his beard. Harry settles on staring at a spot by Louis’ shoulder, because his eyes keep wavering to the scar on his cheek, and he feels immensely rude whenever he looks there, but too uncomfortable to meet Louis’ eye.

“I take it you’ve never seen a fish bled.” Louis attempts a smile. It’s a little wonky, and he looks like he regrets the words the moment they leave his lips. Harry just shakes his head in response. “You get used to it.”

Harry shrugs. Bubbling beneath the surface of all this is the urge to explain that he isn’t fragile in that way, that he’s dealt with things far worse than a bleeding fish. At the same time, though, his fingers still feel full of stardust, and under the table his knees are jittery, joints sore, and the hollow thud of his chest hasn’t yet eased. 

“You don’t talk much, huh?” Louis says. 

Harry tries not to bristle, shoulders curling in. “Sorry.”

“Nothing to apologize for.” Louis blinks at him. “Just an observation.”

Awkward silence ensues. Harry doesn’t know how to respond to that even if he wanted to, so he looks down at his lap, jaw working, pink clinging to his cheeks. He doesn’t know how to handle himself like this, faced with a stranger in this confined space. He feels like he should apologize for the scene he made on the boat, but just thinking about it now has his throat thickening again. Maybe it’s because he’s so used to the quiet, so used to one-sided conversation. Louis challenges him, and he doesn’t know what to do with it.  

“Do you mind if I…?” Harry flicks his eyes up, blinking out of his thoughts. Louis has slipped a book from inside his coat, the same one he was reading at the bar. 

Louis reads and Harry sits. There’s something strangely intimate about it, this quiet, strained moment of companionship. Louis has a scar along the back of his left hand, matching his cheek, and the skin of his fingers are calloused and rough, torn around his nails. Harry looks down at his own hands, soft and unworn, bony and veiny in pale blues and purples. 

“What’s–” the word escapes his mouth in a sudden burst before his brain can catch up. Louis looks up at him, startled, and when their eyes meet, Harry’s breath sucks itself back into his chest. “Is it, um. Is it good? The book.”

Louis smiles at him slowly, a tiny thing, but there. “So far, yeah,” he says faintly, thumbing the yellow pages. “It’s quite good. I do love Golding.”

Harry just nods absently, panic sparking because he’s _trying_ and he doesn’t know why he is, but now the silence crawls back again and this feels failed. It feels claustrophobic again. 

Louis seems to notice the absence of his reply, the nervousness he’s radiating. “Have you read it?” he asks, prompting gently. “Or any Golding?” 

“I don’t think so,” Harry says softly. He tries to think of something else to say, somewhere to lead the conversation, but nothing comes, and he wants to crumple.

“Do you read much?” Louis continues after a beat. He’s lowered the book now, watching Harry closely, and that faint smile is a ghost on his lips. He looks the most gentle Harry has ever seen him. 

“I did,” Harry says, then pauses. “I mean–. I read, now, but. I only brought, um. Only brought a few books with me.” 

Absently, he wonders how much dust _Black Beauty_ must have gathered by now, still open on the windowsill where he left it on that morning. If it’s even still there at all, or if it’s lost in a box of things left behind, if it’s buried in a dark and dead place, pages soiled from rubbish. He wonders if _Wuthering Heights_ and _Brave New World_ and all those other dog-eared pages he loved almost to death are nothing but a pile in a bin somewhere now. 

“What’s the last book you read?” Louis asks, and when Harry glances up at him, pulling himself from the hollow feeling of a vague yesterday, he’s a blurry figure. He blinks the tears away quickly, hopes Louis doesn’t see.

“ _The Age of Reason_ ,” Harry says. The words taste metallic. 

“Really?” Louis drawls, leaning closer, fighting a wide smile now. Amused. “I didn’t quite have you picked for an existentialist.” 

“I’m not,” Harry says. Something strange curls in his chest when he thinks back to it now, those shelves of dark books that lay untouched. “I don’t think I am, at least. I’m not much of a philosopher.”

“Me either,” Louis says. “I mostly just pretend to know what I’m talking about. Philosopher’s are in thin supply ‘round here, believe it or not.”

He’s smiling gently, coaxing, and Harry’s chest hurts with it, aches when he gives an empty smile back, fingers curling into his palms, knuckles digging into his knees. He swallows and looks away as the conversation fades and Louis goes back to reading, gaze lingering just for a moment. Harry doesn’t know where to go from here. He wants to leave, wants to tuck himself away for the afternoon and try to process the still shuddering ache of his ribs, sleep away the slimy, wide gaze of the haddock. But then Louis’ foot brushes his under the table, the record switches over with a fuzzy _zwup_ , and in that bubble of a moment, he finds one tiny slither of ease.

-

He isn’t sure when it happens. It seems that one morning, he’s waking to the muffled _click_ of rocks on his window, stumbling from where the chilled sheets are wrapped around his calves, and the next he’s bundled in his coat, nose tucked into its collar as he waits at the edge of the pier with his legs hanging over the water, _Arlo_ creaking softly beside him, watching the navy of night turn into the navy of dawn. 

The first time, the faint creak of Louis’ footsteps had paused, still distant, like he’d frozen at the edge of the rotting stairs, gaze drawing itself all the way along the pier to where Harry sits. If Harry is early enough, Sully and his crew will be rigging _Mary-Rose_ for the day, the husked grit of their voices floating out over the water, watching him with sneers, with surprise because Harry knows they all expected him to be gone by now, back on the ferry and scampering away. He doesn’t know why he’s still here, either.

They start to meet like that, Harry waiting by the water, turning when he smells the burn of tobacco, the light stomp of rubber on flimsy wood, Louis’ rasped _good morning_ , nothing else passed between them as Harry clambers to his feet and lowers himself into _Arlo,_ untying the knots and pushing them from the wharf, settling beneath the shelter to read for the morning while Louis sets his trawls. 

On some of those mornings, Harry begins to wake when the sky is still bruised black, both sweating and freezing all at once. He walks the beach, finds himself at the end of the pier, and he sits with an aching back staring down at the churning water, the inky swell of it, the gradients of olive green and rotting blue that start to surface when the sky finally tinges with the presence of dawn. Eventually, he’ll settles himself into _Arlo,_ the little boat creaking gently under his weight, and he plays absently with the loose ropes that hang from its side, huddled under the shelter because no matter how gentle the wind is, the way it curls off the water in the mornings is always glacier-cold and sharp as a needle. 

“What are you doing?”

Harry jolts out of his thoughts. The rope in his hands swings with a dull, wet _thunk_ against the side of the boat. 

Louis is staring down at him, and he puts his cigarette out on the old post of the pier, amusement ticking the corner of his mouth. Harry remains silent for a moment, knees knocking together as he looks away. He isn’t sure why he feels embarrassed for being here so early, for pulling himself from bed and managing to feel something other than hollow. 

“Nothing,” he says eventually, looking at his toes. 

“Were you tying knots?” Louis lowers himself into the boat slowly.

“No,” Harry says. Louis’ face flickers again, that hint of amusement that he’s trying to dampen, held behind the steely pale of his eyes as he stands in front of Harry with his arms crossed loosely against his chest.

“Right.” He raises a brow. “You want me to show you one?”

Harry shrugs. His feigned indifference doesn’t seem to deter Louis at all.

“Here, then.” Louis tosses him a rope. Harry fumbles with it awkwardly, the loose ends slapping wetly against his thighs. “Loop one end through that hook, there.” 

There’s a stilted moment of pause between them while Harry hooks the rope.

“Alright,” Louis says softly, switching his hands. “Wrap the loose end over, over the running end. Then pass it through the loop you just made. That’s called a half-hitch.” 

Harry watches the movement, the easy way the thick rope maneuvers to Louis’ hands, rough and steady, and he tries to follow as closely as he can, ending up with a wonky, looser version of Louis’ own rope. _Arlo_ is rocking gently against the pier, a back-and-forth pulse, seawind fluttering their hair.

“Good.” There’s the ghost of a smile on Louis’ lips. “Now do that last step again, but this time, go around and up through the loop.”

Harry crosses his rope hesitantly. “Like that?”

“Uh-huh,” Louis hums. His thumbs run up along the line, pushing delicately, the knot slowly going taut. “Tighten it.” 

The knot Harry ends up with isn’t quite right, bumpy and already starting to loosen a little, but Louis doesn’t say anything, just unties _Arlo_ from the pier and lets them begin to drift. Harry unties the knot from the hook slowly and tries to retrace the steps, pictures Louis’ hands and their gentle, slow movement, trying not make a muddle of his rope again. 

The mornings progress like that, these slow, quiet beginnings. Louis never comments on the fact that Harry is the one waiting for him now, never says anything about the tangled mess of rope Harry often gets himself in, nausea making his head bloom from staring down at the knots he tries to make for hours on end. Sometimes Louis will pause, looking back at Harry over his shoulder, say something like _redo the loop_ or _wrong way_ before turning back to the trawls like he never spoke a word. 

“Hey,” he says on another morning, wind barely there, things calm. Harry darts his eyes up to where Louis is half leant over the back of the boat. “Come help me with this, will you?”

Harry blinks at him, feeling suddenly breathless. “I don’t think that I–”

“It won’t bite,” Louis cuts him off. “Don’t just sit there. Come on, then.” 

Harry rises slowly, tries not to stumble when the waves rock and shift beneath his feet, and he ambles to the stern, hips cradled by it as he leans awkwardly to grasp the slick ropes and net. His fingers keep getting tangled and he can’t stop himself from shaking, and he’s acutely aware of his arm brushing Louis’, their shoulders bumping as they heave up the net against the swelling weight of the water. 

The trawl comes up empty, but Louis just bumps their elbows softly. “Now, help me untangle it.”

It continues that way for the next few days, Harry’s fiddly fingers looping and tugging at ropes and wire and net, the two of them setting and pulling trawls in complete silence save for Louis’ murmured instructions. Nothing else changes, just that Harry’s nausea begins to fade the more he moves around the boat, the more he familiarizes himself with the way _Arlo_ responds to their shifting weight. 

He finds that the routine of those few dawn hours keeps his hands steady, gives him an anchor to think about when his feet are on still ground again and he’s trudging up the beach with his hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched against the wind that pierces around the cliffside. It always fades eventually, becomes replaced with the hollow _thud_ of his heart on his ribs, but when he wakes each day and steps out into the cold dark, sits by the water and watches it reach for his feet, he now has another thought that pokes through the rest. 

There is one morning, though. Harry is helping bring in a trawl, stuck deep in the water, and he leans for it, body bent firmly against the stern. Before he can blink there are hands hauling him back, fleeting and sharp and disorientating as he straightens, heart shaking at the sudden movement. Louis doesn’t even look at him. His jaw twitches, and he nudges Harry out of the way roughly and leans down for the caught net himself.

“Don’t,” he mutters. Harry just stares, rests a palm over his abdomen while Louis hauls up the net, trying to place the odd feeling that’s trying to push his heart into his stomach.

After, when they get back to the wharf with empty buckets and blue lips, his body is still brushed with goosebumps. He isn’t sure if it’s from another person touching him like that, from the panicked imprint of Louis’ fingers curling in his coat, or if it’s simply from the cold. 

-

Winter’s sun has risen, and Harry is still beneath the sheets when he blinks his heavy lids open. 

There’s no sound, the slick _click_ of rocks on the windows absent, and soft light is spilling in across the sheets, slanting into his eyes. It takes him a moment to come to himself, still halfway stuck in the darkness of his dreams. When he does, he registers nothing but the phantom pins and needles of time fuzzing his muscles, and he lays entirely still and swallows against the feeling of his skin curling, against the feeling of his body trying to turn itself inside-out.

Eventually, he’s able to shift himself onto his side, pull the covers up over his head and breathe in the musk of it, the wet-damp that leaks from the gap in the floor and clings to him, the watery grey of morning curling its fingers in the blankets to try and pull him up, to pull him away from the empty fuzz of memories that no longer exist in that part of his mind anymore, that he clings to. It’s been too long since he last tried to recall them, and when all he finds is a blurry, hazed gap and the lingering smell of sunlight from years and years ago, tears blur in his eyes before he can stop them. 

The sun rises fully, noon eclipsing morning, and Harry rolls onto his stomach slowly, cheek pressed into the damp spot on his pillow, dewy and swollen red. Slowly, blinking through the numbness of his limbs, he presses one palm over his heart, the other against his ribs, and curls his fingers in, presses them tightly unto himself in an attempt to hold everything together. It feels as though his ribs are loose, rattling when he breathes, lashes clumped and stuck together. 

The tears pool, settle like a glaze, like the sticky wet of the apartment windows in summer, like the sweat on his skin when he’d press his nose to the hot panes of glass and watch the street below, close enough to almost touch, watching nameless, faceless bodies push and pull and ebb with life, coffee cups and suits and sundresses, and he’d press his palms up to the windows to feel the facade of warmth, pretend it was a person, pretend it was firm sand, flick through the worn, loved pages of _Black Beauty_ or _This Side of Paradise_ and bury his nose into the summer-musk that stored itself in the margins every year, cheeks smudged against the ink.

He yearns for something he never had, guilts for that yearning, for the horrid shame the settles like sludge in the pit of his stomach when he thinks of those youthful days, the days when he’d open up the windows and stick his head out and shout to strangers, when his heart would lurch in his chest at the drop down to the street, when his heart would be still in the summer nights and all he listened to was her breathing and the same records, watching her and hoping for something good. Watching her and hoping for something bad, and crying beneath the sheets as soon as those thoughts came. 

He still has those thoughts now, still has them even though she isn’t here anymore, and he can’t break past it, past this guilt and this helplessness and he wants to sit up and open the windows and scream, run into the thrashing ocean and drown like he always wished he could in those summers, when the smell of sea-salt was a facade and all he ever really smelt was hand sanitizer and oil and the sweating city, the American stench, concrete, trapped between the walls. 

He doesn’t move from bed all day, doesn’t eat, and it feels like both a lifetime and a blink before dusk settles. The chair across from him is empty, but it feels dipped with a weight, and if he looks at it hard enough he can see himself sitting there, bathed in silver, see his frail, thin body at twelve, see that same body at fifteen and eighteen, the stoop of his shoulders and the books in his hands, and he looks up at himself and feels the insatiable need to disappear. For a moment, he’s staring through the eyes of a younger him, something reflexive and twisting and he almost sits up when he sees himself lying there, almost scampers out from underneath the sheets at the sudden surge of terror that fills him, the surge of _no-no-no_ that tries to make his limbs move. 

He remains still. He falls back asleep. He doesn’t dream.

-

Louis is sitting at the end of the pier the following day, waiting. He’s just a red speck, the sky and Cape Breton’s sea impossibly huge and wide, a blend of dreary grey and blue, thrashing waves pushing whitecaps up to the surface. Each step Harry takes feels weighted with glue, sticky and gluggy, and his under eyes are bulging, swollen from the effort he makes in keeping the tears hidden, temples throbbing from the amount he’d slept and cried and been completely somewhere else. 

Louis turns when he hears Harry’s footsteps approaching, stubs out his cigarette, the red-orange glow flaking to nothing, grey, dead paper floating up and mixing with the seafoam. The smoke flows out from his nostrils, escapes his cracked, thin lips. “Hey.” 

The word has a slow, careful way about it, that same timidness evident in Louis’ features, the tense flicker of his gaze over Harry’s face. He’s looking at Harry the same way Kenna had looked at him when she left him in that empty house, the same look his manager had given him in New Brunswick, the same look his mother had given him in those last few months. He loathes it. Louis looks at him like his words might break him, glass about to splinter, one wrong footfall away from shattering into a million tiny pieces. 

“Hey,” Harry breathes, and he knows, meeting Louis’ eyes, that his words could break him easy as anything. He almost wants Louis to bring his boot down. 

“You didn’t come yesterday,” Louis says, still careful, quiet, dead cigarette hanging loose between his fingers like he can’t figure out what to do with it. 

“Sorry,” Harry murmurs, jaw ticking, flicking his eyes away to the empty spaces the trawlers have left. He doesn’t know what else to say.

“It’s…fine,” Louis says. He scratches awkwardly at his arm. 

It doesn’t feel fine, for some reason. It feels like a failure even though Harry isn’t obliged in any way to be here. It just feels like giving up again. Like he has the option to run away now if he really wants to. 

“Are you–.” Louis cuts himself off, and they just watch each other for a moment, gazes skidding before they settle on other parts of their bodies, a shoulder or chest, unable to maintain that contact. “Are you okay?”

“Yes.” Harry lowers himself into _Arlo_ and turns away. Louis remains paused on the pier for a moment, still fiddling with his cigarette. Finally, he flicks it away without an ounce of guilt as the tiny bud gets swallowed by the waves. When he climbs into the boat their eyes don’t meet, but there’s a suspended stillness, neither of them moving. 

Harry pushes them from the pier and fights the urge to slip down into the gap between the boat and the wood. Wonders what would happen if he got caught between. He blinks the thought away and turns to the sea. 

They work silently together. It’s a dark morning, that grey light hanging and refusing to budge under the push of the sun, the weak white of light stuck flailing uselessly atop the water. The waves are choppy and short, jolting and licking wet and fat against _Arlo’s_ sides, rocking them in a syncopated, snapping rhythm. They’re soaked within the hour, hands veiny and cold and covered in pearly droplets as they pull up empty nets, fingers numb when they curl and fiddle to untangle them. 

Harry’s stomach dips when the next net they pull up is weighted and jolting under their hands. The haddocks are slippery and shiny in the grey light, emerging from the dark water like gems, and they flutter and flail uselessly against the green sheen of the nets, gills shrinking and expanding rapidly when they finally throw the nets down onto the deck.

Louis is nimble and quick with them, hooking his hands up in their gills and pulling them from the tangles, knife in a steady grip. Harry doesn’t look away quick enough the first time, gaze caught with the gasping fish, the gooey, petrified white staring straight through him until there’s suddenly blood spilling against its slick body. Harry snaps his head out to the sea before the nausea can rise and curl from his mouth. His eyes prickle.

“Sorry,” Louis says, but it’s a dull snap, a clenched jaw, and Harry lets his teeth grind together for a moment as he listens to the quiet crackling sound of the knife cutting through scales, the heavy weight of the still breathing haddock being tossed into the bucket, the thump of its body as it panics in that tiny space. Louis simply glares when their eyes tentatively meet, turning to the next fish, knife and fingers streaked red. 

The silence remains once they reset the trawls, but with each pull and push Harry feels closer to crying, exhaustion flooding his shoulders and arms with a heavy blueness, like his muscles are one by one shutting down and leaving him with no control. He somehow feels like he’s messed up something that didn’t ever exist, that he’s somehow managed to upset everything and everyone here, and that overbearing urge to get away is roaring to life, that same breath-shaky panic that had curled up and made a home in his chest again after New Brunswick, powdery, broken porcelain and ground coffee dusting his hair while he’d sat on a mouldy bin in a dirty, oil-slick alley and cried. Sometimes, it feels like that part of him has always been there. 

He doesn’t notice he’s stopped pulling until Louis gives the net a purposed, frustrated tug, upsetting Harry’s balance and jolting him so sharply that they end up facing each other, and the moment their gazes lock, something fiery and electric buzzes between them. Louis is staring him down something fierce, a brewing anger in his iced eyes. It begins to melt after a moment, though, flickering wildly over Harry’s own expression, the panic and overwhelm that he’s trying desperately to mask with contempt. 

“I’m, um.” Louis is the first to look away, fiddling with the net as he releases a shuddery breath, seeming to shake himself. “Sorry. Again.”

He looks as helpless as Harry feels, searching for words, that sharpness gone from his eyes and replaced with an uncertainty that Harry has never seen from him before, some strange type of guilt, of sympathy. “I’m not great at being nice to others, as you’ve probably noticed.”

He chuckles, but it’s depreciating and too soft and it doesn’t meet his eyes. Harry doesn’t feel like he should laugh along. It doesn’t feel right to laugh.

A wave dips them, and Harry’s stomach touches his heart. “It’s alright.”   

Louis just nods and looks unconvinced, with himself or with Harry’s reply, Harry doesn’t know. 

They head back to the wharf shortly after, the waves in the harbour growing too choppy for _Arlo’s_ tiny body. _Mary-Rose_ and her company are still far out on the water. Along the beach, a gaggle of young children and flinging wet sand at each other, all in matching coats and boots, grains stuck on the edges of their pink faces, their mother watching them from the stoop of a house, smoking slowly and watching the water, the vague shadow of the trawlers returning as morning comes into full fruition. Harry watches them and feels out of body, listens to their high pitched laughter, all eight of them at home with their toes dug into the beach, pale kids with bright eyes, nothing salt-cracked about them.

They look untouched and nothing like their mother. 

“You hungry?” Louis asks, and Harry startles as he starts to climb up onto the pier, looking back over his shoulder into the boat. 

“Uh,” he starts, because Louis isn’t watching him, is hauling the rigid haddocks into an icy tub, shoulders tense. “Sure.” 

He’s really not. But Louis nods, wipes his hands on a dirty, damp rag and climbs up after Harry, the two of them walking side by side up the pier, up onto the body of the wharf and ducking their chins against the wind. When their toes touch the sand, making their way up and along the beach to cut through the front line, the woman on the stoop whistles high and piercing, breaking through the wind, her children perking up like dogs at the sound, paused in their sandy playing. She calls to them, a terse and demanding _come here_ , and Harry watches as their lithe figures scramble up from the water, the older kids still smiling and shoving as they do so, ducking and weaving through Harry and Louis as they walk past.

The woman on the stoop watches them, scowls and scratches out her cigarette on the stoop, a jagged black scar that joins the others on the old, sea-clogged wood. 

Louis pauses for a moment, almost like a stutter, his eyes darting quickly away from the women and down to his toes before he doubles his pace, flicking up sand. Harry fumbles to follow, looking back over his shoulder. The woman has her elbows on her knees, wrists crossed daintily, piercing eyes never wavering from them as they retreat up into the shadows of the homes, then onto the pale street, the water and the wharf a dull _hush_ in the distance. 

They remain silent. Louis leads them to one of the shiny, alien seafood chain restaurants in the middle of Cape Breton’s small body, almost like a false heart, the steady _thump-thump_ of the harbour muted here. He doesn’t meet Harry’s eye once, not when he pulls open the tall glass door, not when the waitresses look up and scatter slowly, ignoring their presence as they walk past the cheery _please wait to be seated_ sign when it becomes apparent nobody is coming to seat them, not when he leads them to a booth in the very corner of the restaurant, not when the chefs with their salt-skin and veiny eyes and wiry white hair peer at them through the gleaming metal of the pass.

There’s something so uncomfortably palpable that settles, and Harry blinks slowly as he looks around them, looks at the visiting families, so obviously tourists in their clean fur lined coats and soft pants, smooth hands and clear cheeks. They’re watching him back, watching Louis, chewing their food slowly and then feigning indifference when Harry accidentally catches their eye. When he finally glances back over at Louis, he can’t look away.

He’s playing with the corners of the menu, eyes downcast, chin angled against his shoulder towards the window, morning light flooding in, shining on the dew-pink skin of the scar on his cheek, the scar he’s ducking his head down against. Something hot and sharp and indescribable pools behinds Harry’s lids, something akin to a kick in the chest, and he’s been squeezed dry and wrung out but now he’s back in that water, soaking everything up and trying to swallow against each spongy gulp of sudden melancholy. 

“What’s good here?” he manages, a dull croak. Louis blinks up at him.

“I don’t really know,” he admits, almost sheepish. “I haven’t been here since I was a teenager.” 

“Oh,” Harry says. They’re mirroring each other now, both toying with the fuzzy edges of the menus until little balls of paper fray and bend under their damp fingers. 

“Honestly, I never really ate here as a teenager, either,” Louis sighs, propping his scarred cheek in his palm, covering it. “They just do greasy food and I thought that might help make up for me being such a cunt.” 

Harry has no response to that, staring a little bewilderedly. Louis sighs again, wipes his hand down the side of his face and murmurs a low _nevermind,_ then looks out the window with his shoulders tucked in. Harry can still feel gazes on them, the atmosphere so tinny and tense, and as he watches Louis’ eyes close, almost like a personal moment of pause that Harry feels he’s intruding in, he wonders how it is that all these begrudged, aloof parts of Louis that he’s seen have come to be, these walls of ice on his eyes, cold and unforgiving and steely. Wonders why every time he enters a space a chilling spotlight seems to shine down on him, one that he curls away from and bites back against with snarled teeth. 

He watches Louis now, sees his twitching fingers and his twitching jaw, the tense lines of his shoulders that read like some kind of nerves, a reluctance. And then he thinks of the ferry, of Kenna and the house and the first time he’d tried to be brave on the wharf, tried to be brave when Louis had cut that fish clean through its neck like nothing, when the sea rocked the little boat and he felt like maybe they’d capsize and he’d sink to the bottom. He thinks of how Louis has been coaxing him from under the shelter slowly, thinks of his hands on Harry’s arms, the coat that still constricts his chest. He thinks of how he and Louis have yet to meet in the middle of anything, but somehow, Louis has managed to pull Harry out of being too afraid to look away from the horizon when _Arlo_ floats out over the reef.

He thinks of Sully and the trawlers and the bar and his chest is suddenly filled with a feeling that he can’t place, overwhelming and new.

“Excuse me,” he blurts loudly, holding his hand out to stop a waitress that’s passing them, tray in hand and ignoring their presence. She almost jolts, a pink flush on her cheeks, a young thing that’s got those same soft, unworn hands, those clear eyes. Not from here, or too young to have been touched by the things others seem to have been touched by. 

He has a moment of blind panic, in which his rationality catches up to the steady thumping of his chest, and he blinks down at the old menu frantically, searching for something, anything, to pinpoint. He can’t remember the last time he’s eaten something fried and fatty, something that wasn’t bland and boiled. He’s shaking a little, as he meets the waitresses eye, tries to lift his chin and breathe. 

By the time he’s fumbled his way through ordering them a basket of fries to share, his neck feel coated in a cold sweat. The waitress hurries away without looking at them again. Louis, though, Louis is looking at Harry now, facing him properly. All that grey-dew light is pouring in, glossing the windows, glossing his eyes and making them translucent and Harry can see right through him just for a moment, can see the gentleness and the gratitude before Louis blinks and it wavers into something guarded and almost self-conscious.

“Thanks,” he murmurs.

He pulls his book from his coat and flicks through the yellow pages. They settle into silence again.

-

For the following week, Harry wakes normally again, as normally as he can, anyway, blinking into existence and feeling his way through the pre-dawn shadows of the bedroom, down the creaking stairs, along the whistling beach, watching hollow waves clutter and slide up the sand. It’s been raining intermittently and the grey fog of cloud refuses to leave the water, hovering there in a dull mist that swallows the mountains each time it’s hands reach for Cape Breton’s cliffside. Harry tucks his nose into his coat, tucks his knees together, and sits by the water as dawn finally blooms in all it’s frosted glory, peeling back the layers of darkness like flaky paint, navy fluttering onto the water to let the greys and whites of the horizon start to ebb. 

Louis is being careful with him in a way that he hasn’t been before, not since the day on the boat, the day after Harry had remained inside that shaky house. It’s a quiet hesitance, a gentleness. An effort to stop himself from snapping and scratching at his jaw and inhaling sharply through his nose, so very unlike the standoffish and secluded front that Harry has been shown so far. He doesn’t ask Harry to help him, for one, but Harry can’t help but feel obliged now. It almost feels unnatural to gather beneath the shelter, and he finds that after a half hour of reading, of moulding his thumbs into the margin-dents that someone else has left, he has to stand and feebly stretch, approaching Louis and his nets with caution, with a numbed eagerness, because he truly isn’t eager, either. He’s caught somewhere on a strange spectrum. 

“Hey, sailor,” Louis will greet him with, one part amusement and another part apprehension, and Harry often wonders if he’s not the only one stuck on this spectrum, that perhaps they’re suspended somewhere together. He just can’t figure out why, or what, or how. It’s the same way he’d felt outside the bar, standing in the flurry of snow as they’d watched each other, as they tried to understand and pull apart the intricacies of their understanding without saying words. 

Louis joins him today. It’s so bitingly cold, all frosty, wind-whistling air and foamy water. The small drops that spray up from the waves feel like tiny pinpricks of glass. Their shoulders brush as Louis sits, legs dangling over the water, and Harry takes a moment just to watch, observing the difference in their legs, the loose, fuzzy threads on Louis’ pants, the scuffs and salt-cracks around his boots. Against the dark morning they’re a red and yellow speck made dull and smudged together by the foggy rain. Louis fumbles through his pockets for his lighter, his carton, their elbows knocking together, and only once the end of his cigarette is glowing red and smouldering, once he’s inhaled slow and exhaled slow, does Harry finally tuck his hood back a little, their eyes meeting curiously.

“Morning,” Louis says. Little raindrops cling to the wisps of his hair, caught in his beard. He huddles into himself and inhales again, shielding the end of his cigarette when the wind howls fiercely and sneaks up under their coats. “Fuckin’ freezing.”

Harry hums and pushes his wet hair from his temples, tugs his hood back further over his head and stares down at the water. It’s all blurry now, smoke wafting around them. “Perhaps it’ll snow.”

“Per _haps_ ,” Louis says, slightly put on. Harry ducks his head and scratches softly at his suddenly warming jaw. He keeps his gaze low, lets it trail from the water back up the beach, to where the orange kitchen bulbs are starting to glow like oil-lantern light, slick and fuzzy, protruding gently into the still dark. 

They settle into silence. Louis smokes the same way he moves, Harry thinks. Slow at first, measured, sure but so unsure all at once, always hesitating when he brings the burning bud to his mouth, before he inhales for so long that Harry’s ribs themselves begin to twist and turn, only settling when Louis finally exhales like a sigh, head drooping a little with the weight of it. Harry finds himself closing his eyes unconsciously, still facing the beach, while the smoke wraps around them both. At first it had bothered him, maybe. Maybe because the only time he could recall the cigarette smell was in his father’s study, stale and stubbed out and hidden, the lingerings of it from years and years ago when he was just a boy, still in England and throwing pebbles at walls and watching creaking planes fly. 

Now, it seems to have settled him with a familiarity instead of the heart-aching fuzz of a distant, far off memory. Louis seems to notice his quietness, his measured breaths, and it’s only when he speaks again that Harry realizes their breathing is synchronized, that with each fatal, long breath Louis inhales, Harry’s lungs have expanded just the same, expanded until they feel ready to give out. 

“You don’t mind, do you?” Louis asks, gesturing with a bow of his fingers. The cherry end of his cigarette is wrinkled with amber, with the same lingering darkness that waits on the horizon. 

“No.” Harry scratches at his pants gently, gaze still lowered. “Not at all.” 

“Want some?” Louis asks. He outstretches his hand, and the smoke is heady and all Harry can smell, taste, and it becomes too strong then, suddenly, the familiarity vanishing. 

Harry shakes his head and clasps his fingers together. The moment between them, if there was one at all, dissipates with one last rattling breath. 

“Come on,” Louis murmurs. He stubs out his cigarette. “Let’s head out.” 

The ocean is tremulous and ill-tempered, and out in the harbour the rain falls thicker than it did on the shore. Their coats become slick and slippery, as do their hands. Harry’s fingers are tinted purple and red, raw from pulling up nets. He’s begun to find tiny calluses on their tips, roughness on his palms that he’s never noticed before. Sometimes, he can’t help but let his eyes wander to Louis’ hands and Louis’ skin, to the cuts and the scars and the shadows of use, then higher, glancing up to his cheek, to the fleshy, faded pink there that he always darts his eyes from just as quickly, embarrassed by his own staring when Louis raises a simple brow at him. 

It’s early when they head in. Harry’s bones are weary and sore from trying to keep himself steady atop the waves, muscles gone jelly-like, and he’s saturated, chilled to the bone and shaking. The ache to crawl into bed and disappear is nagging, now, sneaking up like a taunting whisper. They tie up _Arlo_ , shake the rain from their hands. Harry climbs out first and lowers his hood in an attempt to brush his sopping hair from his eyes, blinking away misty droplets. Below, Louis lights a cigarette and lets it dangle from between his lips as he climbs up onto the pier. 

He coughs lightly into his fist and pulls back his own hood, shakes out his hair. They look a sight, really, all drooped with rain water, pale-skinned and salt-covered, standing together before the harbour. Louis looks up at Harry for a moment, cigarette to his lips like he’s almost hiding behind it, before he flicks his gaze to his toes and swallows, jaw working.

“Um,” he starts, scratches at his beard as he raises his eyes again. Harry doesn’t quite know what to say. Things feel odd, off. “D’you–”

“Tomlinson!”

Their heads both turn. A man is tumbling his way down the wharf, plodding with heavy, ill-footed steps down to the pier. Louis has paused, a scowl flickering over his features before he cools his eyes into something aloof and distant, jaw clenched tightly. The man has a thick belt around his waist, dressed entirely in dark green, coat zipped right up to his chin. Harry blinks at him, at the hollow thunk of his loud and weighted steps, the sneer that starts to scrunch his nose as he approaches.

“Sheriff Wellard,” Louis greets lightly. 

“She’s some cold out, huh?” Wellard says as he finally comes to a stop, tugging the zipper of his jacket up, then tucking his pointed chin beneath the fabric. He’s beady-eyed, sockets sunken into his face, with patchy facial hair and red cheeks. 

“Uh-huh,” Louis agrees. He shifts, shoulders curving in. “What do you want, Sherriff?” 

“Standard visit.” Wallard claps Louis’ shoulder and brushes past them, hands on his hips as he stares down at _Arlo_. “Just checkin’ you’re up to code.”

Louis remains unmoved, chest heaving with a measured, patient breath before he speaks again. “You see Sullivan, too?”

“Nah.” Wallard stretches his shoulders lazily, still standing like he’s observing Cape Breton and her shore. “Seen _Mary_ couple of weeks ago.”

“And me,” Louis says quietly. “You checked me at the start of the season.”

“Did I?” Wallard muses. Louis breathes again, that same measured way. Harry takes a slow step back, watching the interaction with a rattling feeling in his ribs. 

“You did,” Louis grits out. 

“Huh,” Wellard huffs, chuffed. “Well, I’m here now. May as well–”

“You’ve got no fuckin’ right to hound me, Sheriff,” Louis turns, then, whirls like a cracked whip. Harry’s chest seizes, startled by the movement, by the strained thunder that pulses Louis’ speech.  

“I’ve got every fuckin’ right,” Wallard says, calm and collected as he glances at Louis over his shoulder. “Unless you wanna bet I don’t?”

“Fuck off,” Louis says. Harry’s mouth parts at that. He wants to back away, now, alarmed and unsure of what’s happening, unsure of what to do with Louis speaking this way to someone in this type of authority. He’s obviously missing something, part of a story or a past, the same one that shines that chilling, awful spotlight down on Louis constantly, the one that makes Harry feel skittish and shaken. 

“Listen, you owly prick,” Wallard steps closer, lowers his voice, and prods a harsh finger into Louis’ chest. Louis blows a steady stream of smoke between them in retaliation. The Sheriff's brow twitches slightly, teeth grinding. “It’s my damn responsibility to make sure that everyone ‘round here is safe, on the water and off the water–”

“The fuck is that supposed to mean?” Louis snaps.

“You know what I mean, Tomlinson,” Wallard says, and Louis falters, goes deadly quiet and inhales so strongly and bitterly that Harry’s entire body aches with it. “Greasy fucker like you, I’ll have you off the water come spring if you don’t settle, tell you right fuckin’ now.” 

“I haven’t done anything,” Louis says. He punctuates each word strongly, leaving slight pause between them. “I never fucking did _anything_.”

Harry feels as though he’s not quite present. He’s drifted somewhere else, somewhere distant, watching this unfold as though watching from somewhere unseen, taking in the steely, stoic anger that’s fluttering Louis’ jaw, the disdain and snarl that’s curled around the Sheriff’s mouth, the way they leer and regard each other with a terse frustration. Louis looks moments away from something drastic, body coiled up tight and tense. 

“Right,” Wallard huffs. He rests his hands back on his hips jauntily and finally looks over Louis’ shoulder. “Who’s this?”

“Harry,” Louis answers before Harry can. “He’s visiting from New York.” 

“What’s his business, then?” Wallard asks, looking between them both curiously.

“Staying at Kenna’s old place,” Louis explains. He drops his cigarette between their feet. It hits the Sheriff’s boot, which causes his eyebrow to twitch again, and rolls between the planks. “On holiday.” 

Wallard makes a quiet _huh_ of a sound, peering at Harry with scrutiny, looking him up and down. Then, he turns, and promptly begins to descend the ladder down into _Arlo_ , landing with an awkward _thud_. Louis watches silently. The air around them is tense, so much so that there mightn’t be any at all. It’s just prickling seafoam and morning blinking into existence, the startling sound of Wallard shifting and sorting through the cabin.

“Louis,” Harry tries quietly. His hands are curled into too-tight fists in his too-tight coat.

“Don’t,” Louis cuts him off, chest ballooning slightly with a breath he doesn't quite catch in time. 

Finally, apparently satisfied, the Sheriff pulls his body from the tiny inside of the cabin and wipes his hands on his jacket, coated in a fine layer of sand and ocean salt and dirt. Louis glares from down the line of his nose when he starts up the ladder, and they don’t break eye contact. Wellard shakes his head and lets out a dull chuckle.

“Still haven’t thrown all them books out,” he says, almost offended as he scoffs quietly. “After all that trouble.”

Louis remains stoic and silent. The pier creaks below them, groans when those harsh sea waves finally start to push onto the shore. On the horizon, the sun is feeble and still dark and Harry watches as Louis is the first to flick his gaze away, down to his toes then out to the beach, to the cliffs. Wallard lingers until he finally realizes Louis has nothing more to say, and he leaves with one last ill-suffering sigh, a sheltered glare in Harry’s general direction, before his feet thump obnoxiously back up to the body of the wharf, waving and calling a greeting to the trawlers that are becoming more than vague silhouettes, _Mary-Rose_ and her company getting ready to dock. 

“What was that,” Harry finally manages, when the words scratching and trying to crawl up his throat finally spill. They still haven’t moved. Louis doesn’t even seem to acknowledge that Harry has spoken, just keeps his gaze lowered.

Then, fervently, restlessly, Louis moves. He slips down the ladder, lands in _Arlo_ and starts to untie the knots with shaking fingers.

“Louis?” Harry says quietly. He balances himself by the ladder, watching things around them tremble. 

Louis ignores him and pushes off from the pier, the little boat already rocking in the rough water. He looks furious and flushed and Harry watches on with a tug in his chest, almost steps out after him like some kind of twisted instinct, an urge to plunge into the water and swim to the boat and pull himself in, to be dripping and sodden and soaking it all up, to apologize for something he was never remotely involved in but somehow, someway, when he sees the poorly hidden anguish in Louis’ pinched features, feels deeply connected to.

He tries not to feel empty as he watches _Arlo_ drift away. Standing at the edge of the pier though, holding on to a chipped, splintering pillar for dear life, the harbour and the ocean and the horizon so huge before him it looks as though he’s about to be swallowed whole by the magnitude of their existence, he’s nothing but a hollow shell. All that lingers is this longing, this numb ache in his fingers and his knees, in the very centre of his chest, like his brittle bones are lined with the residue of what once was and is now gone. Louis is just a speck now and Harry watches the sky go frosty blue until his skin feels frozen solid, until morning passes and little _Arlo_ is still nowhere to be seen.

-

_He flung open the shutters: the street was deserted, the sky lowering and grey, it was cooler than the day before – a veritable morning._

Late noon encases the house in a dark shell, lit from within by the lamp at the bed, just a feeble, fuzzy yellow that splays deep gold shadows up the walls, sends the silhouettes of furniture elongated and spindly. The wind still curves around the cliffs, and through the buck-tooth gap of the still undiscovered floorboard, Cape Breton whistles a low, eerie trill up the stairs, into the bedroom, and tickles at Harry’s bare ankles. 

He has the hole-ridden quilt tucked around his legs, curled up in the dusty armchair upstairs. There are still no curtains, and by the windowpane, the glow of the lamplight and the beginnings of the moon’s pale shine intersect and bleed into one another. It’s quiet and Harry is half-asleep, running a thoughtless finger up and down the yellowed margin of the paperback and listening to the gentle sound it makes. There’s a weight pressing against his chest, or perhaps pushing from the inside, trying to escape.

_He spun a tap on the wash-basin, and plunged his head in water: I too am a man of the morning. His–_

_Clink_.

Harry pauses, finger stilling, and glances towards the eclipsing light that shines the window. Silence. Cape Breton whistles a quiet, syncopated tune. He turns back to the page.

_His life had fallen at his feet and lay there massed, it still enveloped him and enmeshed his ankles, he must–_

_Clink._

He blinks up at the window again. Breathes.

_He must step over it, he would leave it lying like a dead skin. The bed, the desk–_

_Clink. Clink._

Harry’s eyes jump back to the window as he closes the book, jump to the little chips and scratches that have accumulated on the glass, seeming vivid now against the moonshine. The silence settles heavily again, and he wonders if he imagined it. Nothing more comes, just another slow, dreary hum under Cape Breton’s breath, a murmur of _sleep-sleep-sleep_. He places the book on the armrest and rises on shaky legs.

It feels like a ghostly drift when he pads down the stairs, and he’s barely thinking when he manages to heave the door open, all the sea air and the cold wind rushing inside with sudden alacrity, filling each nook and crevice and blowing his hair against his forehead, snaking up along his wrists and his ankles. His feet are bare and he’s in thin cotton pajamas and Louis has one foot on the beach and one foot on the stoop, hands stuffed in his pockets with a flustered wideness to his eyes, looking back over his shoulder at Harry like he was about to knock but decided not to, about to make his hasty retreat. It’s freezing and misty but just for that moment Harry feels nothing, and they stand there watching each other, the fur on Louis’ coat rustling against his beard and neck, beanie pulled low over his ears.  

The sky has gone dark but there’s still a fragile strip of burnt amber on the horizon, the last gasping breath of a winter sun trying to keep its head above the water, and it flickers like a glossy flame across the waves, touches the tip of the beach and edges Louis in this faint, dreamy gold, painting him as nothing but a shadow, a sunspot. Just like the window upstairs, silver and gold flash and bleed together, and Harry stands in the shadow of that navy darkness and curls his toes into the barren floor, wondering how it would feel to let himself dip into the lingering yellow. 

He doesn’t know what to say, and it seems neither does Louis. They stare dumbly at each other in silence.

“Sorry,” they say together. Louis shakes his head, lip twitching as he does so. There are goosebumps shuddering on Harry’s skin, prickling when Louis trails his gaze from his bare feet back up to his eyes. Harry flushes and ducks his head, arms crossed around his middle, still half-hidden behind the door.

“I’m gonna go drink myself to death,” Louis says. Harry glances back up, watching the wry flicker that settles on Louis’ expression. “Want to come with?” 

“Okay,” Harry agrees, after a beat, in which he feels momentarily filled with the panic of not knowing what to do or say. They both linger awkwardly, until Harry finally clears his throat and gestures with his thumb to inside. “I’ll just–. I’ll get dressed. Sorry.”

“Okay,” Louis says, and he settles on the stoop and digs into his pockets for his lighter. Harry feels frozen. His body doesn’t allow him move until the first puff of smoke is drifting up from Louis’ lips. 

Back upstairs, he moves mechanically to change into trousers and a thick woolen sweater, one that smells of home and dust and being trapped in a cupboard for too long. It cradles his neck and cuffs around his wrists, olive green and dark. His worn coat over that, holes in the elbows. Socks. Shoes. A cursory sweep of his shaking fingers through the short mess of his hair, attempting to brush it away from his eyes. He flicks off the lamp, and the icy blue laps over the windowpane like an oil-spill, gradual and slow, an imaginary puff of smoke trailing behind it, like blowing out a candle. It’s chilled.

They go to the bar. Harry pauses out the front of it as his fingers curl in his pockets involuntarily, stomach twisting. Louis shoulders his way inside and Harry only just manages to follow, the door catching on his arm as it closes behind him when he slips inside, swallowed by the dewy, salty warmth of the tiny room. Thankfully, it’s mostly empty, but every head still turns to them when they enter, every mouth curled into a sneer, every eye averted awkwardly. 

“Evening, Fergus,” Louis says. Fergus doesn’t respond, just grabs two glasses from beneath the bar and pours their drinks. He slides Harry a whiskey neat. Harry only just manages to catch it.

There are only a few tables and chairs inside, and two booths that really aren’t booths at all, just curtain covered frames with old, worn down pillows to cover the splintering wood of the seats. Louis slides into one side and Harry jauntily follows. Their knees knock, and the proximity of the little space is far too close. He tucks his arms into his sides, wrists only just resting on the table. Louis downs his drink in two long, painful swallows, then slides right out of the booth again to refill his glass. He doesn’t return until he’s had another two. Harry watches him in the low orange light and tries to quell the nervous anticipation that curls in his stomach, the apprehension. 

They don’t speak for the longest time. They simply drink. Drink, until Harry feels fuzzy and his limbs feel full of liquid gold and all the warm maroon colours are blurring into one splotchy bundle of gooey heat, his forehead heavy, neck achy. He could almost fall asleep right here, just might as his eyes droop, thumb tracing the lip of his glass in a steady circular pattern over and over. It seems they aren’t going to talk about what happened today, that they may not talk at all. Louis has his head resting against the back of the booth, shoulders limp, staring blearily upward, not at the ceiling but someplace distant and far away. 

Harry isn’t sure if he ate today. Nothing is making much sense. 

“Harry,” Louis finally says, slow, the two syllables drawn out and rolling around his cheeks before they droop onto the table before them. The way their gazes slot together is lucid and dream-like, and Harry’s eyes take a moment to adjust. He can’t stop himself from staring now, transfixed by the scar, by the pale sharpness of Louis’ eyes when he blinks sleepily.

“Yeah?” Harry says. He digs his thumb into the lip of the glass, feels the sticky residue there, trying to ground himself with something physical because his mind is floating. 

“Do you think I’m a bad person?” Louis asks, blatant, yet somehow the softness of his words makes it sound like a simple afterthought, like he hasn’t just constricted Harry’s entire chest with that question.

“I hardly know you,” Harry says quietly, because it’s the truth and his liquid mouth is finally pouring open. “But, no. I don’t think you’re a bad person.” 

Louis nods and picks at the chipped tabletop, lips pressed into a thin line. 

“Can I ask you something?” Harry says, after a bout of heavy silence. He hadn’t realized, but he’s picking at the skin around his fingernails, and the skin is pink and raw and it hurts when he curls them under his knees. His throat feels full of heat and something bad but somehow the words still escape and claw their way out, despite his insistence to keep them down. 

“Sure,” Louis huffs a breath and brings his empty glass to his mouth, taps the bottom with a delicate finger. 

“Why did you keep coming back?” Harry asks. Louis lowers the glass slowly, keeps it pressed to his lips. “Why do you take me out on that boat?” 

He isn’t sure why this is the question his fuzzy brain conjures. Or maybe, he isn’t sure why he feels the sudden need to ask it, despite the way its been zipping around in his mind for the short time they’ve known each other, since that night at the bar when they’d stood in the snow and things had felt strangely important for a reason he still can’t place. Maybe it’s because he never thought he could ask, and here, both of them lucid and drooping and slowly melting into each other as the alcohol floods their veins, this might be the only time they’ll ever be open with each other again. 

“I guess I just–. I like things that challenge my perspective,” Louis says. He digs his thumb into the chip he was picking at, looking slightly embarrassed. “You do that, y’know. Make me think about things different. Make me think before I act and make things worse for myself. And, I dunno. You’re nothing like the folks ‘round here.”

Harry doesn’t know what to say to that. They sit in silence again. His chest feels close to collapsing, too many emotions trying to fight for a place at the forefront of Harry’s mind, unable to simply coexist together right now, and he’s hit with waves of different feelings, something dark blue that sits like a deadweight in the pit of his stomach, something rose-red that clings beneath his jaw and behind his ears, and he fumbles awkwardly with his glass. Both of their heads are ducked, and their knees are warm where they’ve been pressed together for the past hour. 

“Why did you come here, Harry?” Louis asks, finally looking up. Harry reluctantly meets his eye. They’re so sharp and icy, even here, where things are so inherently dark. Full of question. Full of curiosity. His voice is barely a whisper. 

And, God. Harry doesn’t know why in that very moment things become overwhelming, but something crashes down like a barrelling wave, scoops him up and carries him into Cape Breton’s cliffside. There’s one lone pulse of something so cold inside him, that same hollowness that he’s carried in his chest for so long now making itself fully known, breaking past the facade Harry has tried to create with whiskey. It’s only fair that Harry answer. Louis answered him. But Harry lowers his eyes and slowly tucks his arms over his stomach, eyes prickling, misty and hot. He leans against the wall and shakes his head slowly.

“Hey.” Louis leans forward slightly, places a gentle hand on the table between them. “You don’t have to say.”

Harry closes his eyes to stop them spilling. He should talk about it. He needs to talk about it, but it hurts so much and he feels so feeble and small, feels fucking ridiculous sitting in this tiny bar in this tiny coastal town, so, so far away from home, not New York, but _home_ , the countryside in England, a time that he isn’t even sure was real, now. It all feels so very distant. 

“Something fucked up happened to you,” Louis says. 

 _Not to me._ Harry’s chest shudders. _Not to me._ But maybe it was him, though, in the end. Maybe it was. He nods once. That’s all he can give, even as his insides burn with the words that are swirling and scrambling and trying valiantly to finally leave the safety of his body, clogging his throat, threatening to let his eyes flood completely and droop thickly on his cheeks. He keeps his lids shut, keeps them squeezed tight.

“Me, too,” Louis whispers, a secret, a breath, two words that Harry realizes have escaped, perhaps from a swirling pit that Louis cradles of his own, a catastrophe of things he could say but chooses not too. And it hits Harry then, what this stillness between them is, this heavy, unshakable thing that bows and makes them bend and almost break under its weight.

They’re alone, together, a tiny fragment of something broken, thrust against the impossibility of something bigger than they themselves could ever be. 

They don’t touch, but with his eyes closed, he can almost imagine the gentle scrape of Louis’ fingers on his wrist. 

-

Bleary is a kind word for the morning that Harry attempts to wade through. A queasy, quiet, morning. His bones feel brittle and his eyes are sunken in, and when he slips that yellow coat on, he tries not to flinch at how smoothly it slides over his arms, how it doesn’t feel as constricting when he buttons it to his chin. Briefly, he catches sight of his hands. Thin, edged purple. Nails bitten down to nothing, cuticles raw and torn and full of salt. Queasy, quiet. He walks to the wharf.

The silence between them is something brand new. It seems, now, with each shift and swell and tidal turn they take, this thing between them takes on a new, omnipresent form, forever changing and forever present. He’s not sure if he’ll ever be able to pinpoint it. The water is deep bottle-blue and the sky is grey and this is all Harry really registers when they’re floating out on the dull waves. The red of Louis’ coat seems too bright, and they work without a word. 

Harry wonders if Louis has forgotten their conversation. Or, if he’s remembered it, and is too embarrassed now to speak, to acknowledge the tiny masked truths they allowed themselves to share. Harry feels flushed just thinking about it, the way Louis had looked at him, _knowing_ and not pushing Harry to say anything more, as long as Harry didn’t push him back in return. That’s what Harry’s come to see, too, this push and pull they’ve established, something that goes both ways. It’s a fine line, and his brain is too fuzzy to remember if their toes dipped over to the other side. 

This new silence too brings a new weight to the air around them, a weight that sits like a familiar friend. _This is it_ , he thinks. _It’s time to go_. _Time to move on_. 

They part ways. Harry goes back to the house. Feels swallowed by the emptiness he finds there. Stares at the bag on the floor, at the dusty cupboard across the room, back to the bag. There’s this listless, nagging buzz in his wrists, shooting up his forearms. He should go. He wants to go. The need to escape is pressing in from all sides.

But then it’s dark. It’s noon, and there’s a rock clicking on the window, and this time, when he treads cautiously downstairs, he’s already fully changed. 

They still don’t speak. Mirrored, leaning against that sticky wall in the bar, they drain glasses and pick at the chipped wood of the table. Harry fills the emptiness in his bones with whiskey until he feels gluggy and sick from it, from the liquid sloshing around his empty body. It takes him no time to sink under the haze of it, cheek pressed into the wood, eyes closing. It isn’t peace, nowhere close to it, but the false heat of alcohol tricks him into thinking that he’s not shaking, that deep down he isn’t cold. 

It continues this way. 

Some nights, Louis will read, and Harry shuts his eyes and listens to the minute scuff of his thumbs on rough paper, or traces the outlines and cracks in the spine, or watches the dark honey of Louis’ lashes shift when he flicks them over the pages. Harry can’t figure out what this feels like, because he still wants to run, still wants to wade into the waves and be swallowed, to catch that ferry again and end up somewhere new, become faceless. Perhaps this feels like something new again, like the moment Louis said his name nights ago, the moment they were falsely brave enough to ask anything of each other, the fronts they defended themselves with before fell. They became estranged, past versions of themselves. 

It’s a layer exposed, sun-dried and salt-cracked, drifting and crumbling away in the sea wind to reveal a vulnerable underbelly, something malleable and careful. Harry wonders how many layers Louis will peel away before he becomes terrified of what’s underneath. If Harry will peel back those same layers in turn and flee, too. If they’ll ever allow themselves to continue prying and peeking in this subtle way. 

There is one night, when Harry peels his dewy lids open, and finds Louis watching him. He’s got his book open but it registers slowly that Harry hasn’t heard the flutter of pages turning for some time. Louis doesn’t make any movement to look away quickly, to deter his glance, and in those few drawled seconds, Harry realizes that it might already be too late to run away, now, because he sees something akin to a mirror in Louis’ unguarded gaze. And then Louis smiles, a ghostly thing, soft, not full of the sympathy that Harry forever dreads, but of empathy, of some strange kind of understanding. A sad, subtle quirk. Then he continues to read.

On a rainy evening, Louis bookmarks the page with his thumb and lets the cover fall shut.

“I should teach you to gut a haddock,” he says jokingly, with that amused flicker. They’d had a tense, snarled day on the boat. Harry still feels frozen from it. It comes from nowhere, that comment, and it’s abruptness makes Harry’s chest buzz, stomach plummeting. It’s so, so new when he feels his lips pinch together, the muscles in his cheeks working to keep something akin to a smile at bay.

“I don’t think so,” he murmurs.

Louis huffs a soft breath that might be laugh. 

They allow themselves small, half-drunken snippets of one another. Louis oftens initiates them, makes an offhand comment that allows Harry to answer once, and then they go back to drinking quietly. Fergus refills their glasses silently, and from the dark corners of the room Harry attempts to ignore the prickling sensation of eyes watching on, of snarled teeth and the mighty _crack_ of the cues. Some nights, when the crew from the _Mary-Rose_ come in, late enough that they bring the most brittle chill through the door with them, Louis will turn himself into the wall and wait silently until things settle again, and then they go, parting ways on the beach. 

The music inside is always dim and dulled, but it’s usually always the same few records on circulation, and some nights Harry feels closer and closer to his chest caving in each time _Encore_ drifts hazy and fuzzed through the speakers, crackling the same way his memories do inside his mind, made foggy by the whiskey and the heat that prickles in his closed eyes. It’s those nights that compel him to drink more, to hope and pray that Louis will say something, so that just for those few moments he can engage and be present in the moment he’s currently living, just once.

Sometimes, though, that isn’t enough. It takes only the first few seconds of _Deep Purple_ to get him to break, tonight. Louis is reading, half-slumped against the wall, glass empty, and Harry feels close to crawling out of his skin despite the honey that’s sticking like syrup to his insides.

“Do you think–” he starts, slurring the words with his gooey tongue. Louis glances up at him, blinks slowly. “Could I borrow it, after you’re done?”

“This?” Louis holds up the book. Harry nods. “Sure. Can have it now, if y’want.”

“Oh,” Harry breathes, mixed with the dull slide of the book being pushed across the table towards him. “You’re sure?”

“Read it twice now.” Louis shrugs and sits back. Harry nods again, mostly for his own sake, to try and rid the hazy mist still clinging to his eyes. He hadn’t realized it was there in the first place, and hopes that Louis didn’t see it. “‘Nother drink?”

“Okay.”

Soon, just as he began to do in the mornings, he starts to meet Louis on the stoop. There’s a strange comfort in watching the sky fall asleep, watching the waves grow thin as the tide retreats, watching the rare, wintry pink that settles like a glaze on some nights, like blushing snow. Harry sits with his hands in the pockets of his coat, toes curled together and squinting against the sand, and finds his gaze drawn out to the cliffs when that pink settles. It turns the dreary grey of them softer, tints them with these rosy undertones he’s never seen before. 

He also finds strange comfort in watching Louis walk up the beach. When he waits on the pier, Harry only ever finds his presence in tobacco and heavy footsteps, in the dark, deep shadow of cold winter mornings. But watching Louis this way, seeing him as a rosy speck for the first time, much like that pink light on the cliffs, brings Harry something he’s reluctant to call a calmness, but might be something close to it. Especially when Louis’ mouth quirks into a half-smile, when he stops a few metres short of the stoop and lets the pebbles in his hands fall to the damp sand. 

A new normality. A new routine. Wake early, meet at the pier. Disappear. Reappear to each other again at dusk. 

This is the only time they allow themselves to breathe around each other, the first and final blinks of the day, when things are still liminal and foggy, when they can hide behind shadows and conceal things, when they can cradle their layers close. It mightn’t be the best of habits, granted. But then again, Harry has never really been good with that, knowing how to take care of himself. Those nights when he slowly pumps his body full of whiskey, he ends up stumbling along the beach when he and Louis part with his eyes half closed, unknowingly teetering towards the waves like a moth to twisted flame, until he’s able to right himself at the last moment and careen away from the harsh spray of the water. 

At the very least, for those few hazy hours, he’s numb and partly unfeeling, and the cold seeps into his coat and makes a home in his chest, freezes his thoughts partially, freezes them enough that he can collapse into those damp, cold sheets, the ones that don’t really feel so cold when his own skin is icy, and the illusion of warmth fights the chill away for long enough that he’s able to fall asleep. It’s only when he blinks awake with tears in his eyes and he’s unable able to remember how he got into bed, that the hollow, achy cold that never leaves him makes itself fully known again. 

-

The morning he nearly collapses, _Arlo_ is floating calmly over the reef and dawn is barely a breath on the horizon. The heaviness to his limbs isn’t new, and neither is the sleep-crust that sticks to the corners of his eyes, the slow ticking of his brain, the hollow space in his chest. It’s fine. It’s his normality, now. He thinks nothing of it when his vision goes wonky, blames it on spraying seafoam, and he thinks nothing of it when the phantom jelly-like movement of his muscles makes his hands falter as he and Louis pull up nets, until his knees are aching and there’s cotton in his ears, and he realizes he hasn’t really heard any noise for the past few minutes, like there’s a dusty sack over his head and the only thing he registers is the reflection of his own warm breathing.

 _Arlo_ goes up a wave, shifts, and he loses his balances, stumbles backwards and collides painfully with the side of the little boat, fumbling as he goes, still blinking heavy, stange. Louis reaches for his sleeve and pulls him back upright immediately, into the centre of the boat, fingers gripped tight. 

“ _Hey_ ,” he says, face flickering with alarm as he shakes Harry gently. Harry can’t seem to get his eyes to focus. The sun hasn’t yet risen but something is making his vision ache. Louis’ voice is distant. “ _Harry_. Look at me, yeah?”

There’s a new, different kind of fuzziness Harry’s registering, something that isn’t phantom. His knees and his elbows are weak and he has the very sudden urge to let himself fall down. A quiet panic curls around his spine before he can stop it, and he knows it makes a home in his eyes when he finally glances up and sees the look on Louis’ face, brimmed wide with a real concern, cautious as he leads Harry to the shelter and helps him sit down slowly.

He hasn’t let go.

“Harry, I need you to say something,” Louis says. He shifts a gentle hand to Harry’s shoulder, shakes him lightly. Harry closes his eyes. “Hey, no. _Hey_.”

“‘S fine,” Harry murmurs. _Arlo_ is still rocking and he feels queasier than he did on that first day. He feels flat and thin, and it’s a gradual, syrupy thing when he slumps forward, forehead against Louis’ shoulder. He can’t hold himself up and he doesn’t want to watch the water anymore. He hears Louis inhale softly. “I’m okay. ‘S okay. Just.”

Louis’ coat is slippery and it smells of salt and sand and the wind that curls from the cliffs. He feels a brush of skin, the way Louis’ body shifts, the hand on Harry’s shoulder flattening, drawing in. The spots in his vision start to disappear. He can hear the lapping of the water. Louis’ heartbeat under his ear. 

He sits up swiftly, averts his eyes and wrings his hands together in his lap, almost tempted to bring his knees to his chest, to make himself small like a child. His face is hot, and dampness springs to his eyes before he can hide it. He knows Louis sees this time. 

“Sorry,” he blurts, swallows thickly. The panic is still in his chest, but it’s amplified for a new reason now. He hasn’t touched anyone like that for so long, hasn’t initiated that sort of contact since he was a kid. It felt intimate and real and nothing like the times he would press his forehead into his mum’s hip while she slept, wishing she could cradle his head, push her fingers into his hair. It felt like maybe Louis would touch him like that. Care for him. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to–”

“Harry. Calm down,” Louis whispers, and he puts his hands back onto Harry’s shoulders to steady him, to get him to uncurl. “You don’t have to apologize for anything.”  

They rest in heavy silence. Harry refuses to look up. 

“Are you alright?” Louis says, still a quiet, concerned whisper.

“Yes,” Harry answers, robotic, automatic. When there’s no response, Harry finally glances up. Louis is staring at him, unconvinced, thin brows drawn together, and there’s this sadness in his eyes that makes Harry’s throat swell, because he doesn’t want it, he doesn’t want that look, not from Louis. 

“You look like you’re going to fade away,” Louis breathes, staring right at him. 

Harry doesn’t want to crumple, but he feels his face caving, and he has to look away again. He feels caught out and hopeless, embarrassed that he fell into Louis like that, hurting because his brain is screaming at him to do it again, to press his face somewhere close and just breathe, to try and forget. Tears blur his eyes and his stomach twists and it hurts because now that he’s let himself just have that little slice of warmth, he craves it like nothing else, craves the intimacy he can only find in dreams and memories, unreachable. Louis’ hands leave his shoulders and Harry almost reaches for his wrists like a reflex, to put them back, to cup his neck with them, hold him up, hold him steady. 

When they come back to shore Louis lets him go. Harry stumbles up onto the pier and makes a beeline for the wharf, stumbles down into the sand and shoves his hands into his pockets, and he doesn’t look back. He needs to be alone. He needs to go, to begin erasing the memory of Louis’ fingers, the solid realness of his body. The spectrum presents itself again, a this-way-that-way muddle of wishing so badly to burrow into the warmth of someone else, to have someone there for him in ways he never did, and wishing to never, ever be touched again, to remain in this internal solitude because the thought of letting anyone get close like that, to know him, know the life he’s lived and the thoughts he’s had, is perhaps more terrifying than anything else.

He’s exposed, raw, his skin salt-pink beneath the next layer, the one that’s already torn through for anyone to peek inside, to press their fingers in and see that he’s nothing but an empty shell. 

The plan to leave comes together as he crosses the beach. He’ll go back to the wharf in a few hours and get tickets for the ferry. Or, he’ll get a car, he’ll drive out into the mountains and disappear and never come back. _Fade away_ , he thinks. There’s nobody to miss him, and there’s nobody for him to miss, either. There’s nothing to tie him down here. He has to go.

But then he gets back to the house and shucks his coat and once it’s in his hands, bright yellow and covered in muck and too small, his thoughts go blank and empty around him like a void. He stomps up the stairs, throws his bag onto the bed and throws open his near-empty drawers. Stares into them, grips their sides fiercely. His toes dig into the floor. He can’t bring himself to move. He still has the coat over his arm.

“ _Fuck_ ,” he sobs, chest ballooning with it, and he throws the coat down, watches the tiny droplets that dot the dusty boards. 

He sits beside it and presses the heels of his palms into his eyes, clenches his teeth against another hiccuped breath. Swallows. Breathes, one-two-three. When he opens his eyes again, he brings his knees to his chest and cradles them there, looks at the coat and then up to the window, at the dreary morning that’s painting the sky grey. The exhaustion catches up to him in waves, and he manages to drag himself to bed, kicking off the cold sheets and curling up with the pillow hugged tight to his body. 

_Run away. Run away. Leave. Go._

Each thought is met with another, and it makes his temples throb. _Run away_ , he thinks, and he sees Louis standing beneath him in _Arlo_ , reserved and full of dread. _Run away,_ he thinks, and he sees Louis with his ducked eyes and his clenched jaw, Louis with his bitterness and his steely, stoic presence. _Leave_ , he thinks, and he sees Louis with his pale eyes and his scarred face and his lonely little boat. _Go_ , the thinks, and he sees Louis with his gentle, barely there smile, with his coaxing hands and his subtle attempts at making Harry feel okay, even if he was the one to make him uncomfortable in the first place.

_Run away. Why don’t you just run away?_

Harry can’t bring himself to move.

-

Knocking wakes him. 

He comes to slowly, face still pressed into the pillow. It smells damp and his eyes are crusty and it’s dark out. Late noon. There’s another round of knocking, and Harry sits up with his head spinning slightly, stumbling when his feet get tangled with the screwed up sheets pooled at the end of the bed. He doesn’t turn on the lights when he pads downstairs, and he feels his way through the dark against splintering, chipped walls, floor creaking under his bare feet. 

He pauses at the door, listens to the next few gentle knocks, the shift of feet. Louis stands huddled before him when Harry tugs the door open, and he wonders how long Louis has been here, if he’s been waiting on the stoop for Harry to come downstairs, if he saw the rare winter pink and wished Harry was there. Harry falters a little, when their eyes meet. He’s still in his clothes from this morning, and his sweater is pulled awkwardly around his torso from sleep, hair curly and tangled from the seawater. 

“Hi,” Louis breathes. His eyes keep jumping around Harry’s face. Harry shifts.

“Hi.”

“I just thought I’d, y’know.” Louis dips his head awkwardly. “Make sure you’re okay.”

“I’m fine,” Harry says. Louis nods slowly, pulls his lips into his teeth.

“Right,” he huffs, shakes his head and looks at his toes, inhaling. “Okay. Okay.”

“Louis–”

“Come on,” Louis say, backing away, down onto the sand. He’s firm. “Grab a jacket.”

Harry doesn’t have the energy to say no. 

With slow steps he trudges upstairs, grabs his coat, the wool lining inside reduced to almost nothing, now, stands in the centre of the room and counts to ten while he breathes, then he heads back downstairs, locks the door behind him, and follows after the trail of smoke Louis has left behind for him until they’re walking side by side up the beach, concealed in the semi-darkness. 

The sand does nothing to help Harry’s weak knees, boots sinking into the damp grains, and he starts to drift up to the front line, eager for firm ground, to sit down again. But Louis doesn’t follow, doesn’t drift. He stays on the beach, and Harry falters for a moment, a few metres of space between them.

“What are you doing?” he says slowly. 

“Follow me,” Louis says. No explanation. He’s quiet, though, and Harry follows reluctantly, closing his eyes momentarily when he half stumbles among a soft mound of sand, a wind-beaten sand castle left for the tide to swallow come morning. They pass the wharf, follow the dented horseshoe of the harbour, trudging towards the opposite cradle of the cliffs. It’s not until they’re nearly at the end of the beach that Harry comes to the slow realisation of their destination. Louis is timid and won’t look up from his toes, just stares at the sand and occasionally flicks his eyes out to the water. 

The house they stop in front of is weather-beaten and broken, much like Kenna’s. It’s the last house on this side of the harbour, facing the sea and taking the brunt of the squalls that pulse up from the waves, and Harry turns slowly, casts his gaze back up the beach. They’re both right on the edge of Cape Breton’s cliffy cradle.   

Louis pauses in front of it, just as Harry does, almost like he’s never seen it before. Then, with a tiny breath, he starts up the broken stairs and pulls a set of keys from his pocket. Harry reluctantly follows. There’s an old rocking chair out front, the cushioning frayed and void of all colour, and the curtains are drawn on the windows inside, cobwebs fluttering in the sea breeze. Louis turns the key with tense shoulders. There’s an air of hesitance to the way he swings the door open, a stop-start motion like he might be about to slam it closed again.

“Come in,” he says quietly, strained. 

The emptiness of it startles Harry. Not because he expected it to be full, but because it seems like a place that was once brimmed with life. There are dozens of empty hooks and empty shelves in the entryway, but they’re only filled with a few items, Louis’ red coat, his fishing boots, a misplaced book. Harry stares at them all, the little rusted rings that fill the space beside him, the box made for a mountain of shoes that only holds three pairs and seems strangely vacant. 

Harry trails after Louis with quiet footsteps. The hall opens up to an old-style kitchen, all dark wood and dark metal, but Harry’s attention is drawn to the dining table. It’s long, chipped and engraved with character, stained on top. There are seven chairs, three either side, one at the head of the table, facing towards the huge curtained window that sits behind the line of low counters in the kitchen. Louis pulls the blinds, dust igniting when the gloomy light pours in, and through the glass the beach and the cliffside is revealed. 

Harry doesn’t know why, but he feels full of nervous energy. He feels like he’s intruding on something, waiting for someone or something else to pop out and terrify him. There are no nicknacks on the kitchen shelves, and when Harry glances into the next room, he sees two couches and an armchair that look like they haven’t been touched for years. A dense rug, a small, half-hidden fireplace. No frames on the walls, more empty shelves. Nothing.

Louis clears his throat. “You can sit down, if you want.”

Harry reluctantly takes a seat at the table, adjacent from the lone chair, eying the empty spaces. It’s still dark, Louis just a shadow leant back against the counter, until he flicks on a copper lamp and the room is illuminated in a blushing, deep yellow, the kind that skims the top of dust with burnt gold and makes things seem fuzzy, like they’re looking through streaky glass. 

He can’t figure out what they’re doing here, why they’re staring at each other in silence without the buffer of the bar, the buffer of being half-hazy and not having to acknowledge anything. He isn’t sure if he feels trapped or not, but then Louis inhales softly and turns, starts to pull pans and pots from the cupboards, little packets of herbs, sealed packaging from the humming refrigerator. Harry sits, watches, and tries not to crawl out of his skin when Louis starts to cook.

Soon, it grows dark enough that the dull lamp emphasizes their shadows. Louis is half-lit by it, his left side bathed warm, his right side caught in refracted darkness, in the moon that’s trying to slip inside by the window. There’s water boiling and things smell of salt and roasting pepper, the steam omitting a strange warmth. Louis rolls up his sleeves and the lamplight dips his skin dewy, makes the fine sinew of his forearms stand out. 

They don’t speak. There’s no music or _cracks_ or drunken laughter to muffle and disperse the intensity of the air. 

Harry fiddles with the bottom of his jacket and tries to breathe evenly. He stares at his hands, at his thin fingers, at the little scrape between his pointer and middle finger from being tangled in a net, the slight rope burn that’s beginning to fade, grazing the fleshy outer part of his thumb and the thin underside of his wrist in rosy pink. Torn cuticles, flushed at a constant red from the salt. The bones of his knuckles are defined and undertoned blue and purple, veins of the same colour snaking up into his sleeves. He suddenly feels suffocated, sitting centred in this unfamiliar place, staring down at these hands he hardly recognizes. That was the point at first, though now, staring at the bumps and scratches and suddenly confronted with the reality of where he is, his chest is far too tight.

“Louis,” he starts, sharp and wonky. Louis startles, pans clunking as he whirls to look at Harry over his shoulder. 

“Yeah?”

“Bathroom?” 

Louis’ features are drawn, careful as he pauses, slightly disfigured and shadowed from the lamp and the darkness outside. “Oh. Um, down the hall. Third on the left.” 

“Thanks.” Harry tries not to wince when he stands, head spinning for just a moment before he rights himself. He has to pause when he ducks into the hallway. There are so many closed doors. He blinks at them for a moment before trailing into the dark, opening the third on the left with fumbling, shaky hands.

It’s sterile and cold inside. When he flicks on the light, he freezes.

There’s a mirror hanging above the old basin, and he catches sight of himself before he can duck his eyes away to the faded shower curtain or the faded tiles, the faded bath-mat, the faded towels. He’s confronted instead with the faded image of a person he hardly knows anymore, that he hasn’t known for a very long time. There aren’t any mirrors in the other house, and he can’t remember the last time he saw himself in anything that wasn’t the disfiguring glaze of a window, some type of shaded reflection, but he’s faced with it now.

He lets the door fall shut behind him, then approaches the vanity slowly, regarding himself like a stranger. 

The gauntness is what startles him most, the sharp hollows of his cheekbones, the tired, sunken circles beneath his eyes, the sickly shadows that cling to his jaw. There was a time, when he first shot up and started to grow, that he’d been broad and lanky. Now, his frame is slight, collar bones protruding, shoulders thin and sharper than he remembers. Everything about him seems frail, and he hates that, he hates it so much that his lips curl up when he stares at his reflection, at his greasy hair and the purple shadows, at the man he doesn’t recognize, a man who still feels like that boy who never got to grow up the right way, the boy who was tiny and clung to his mother’s fingers with a vice grip, the boy that suddenly wasn’t allowed to be a boy anymore. But he doesn’t look like that boy anymore, and that is what terrifies him the most.

He looks at himself now and can’t find the physical traces of himself at twelve, at fifteen and eighteen, the boy that would stare into the mirror during each summer and see the same stilted, empty person despite the changes in his height, the growth in his hair, the peach fuzz that collected beneath his jaw in those last years. During that time he never could distinguish between those versions of himself, felt connected to them like a never ending stretch of worn yarn, and he still feels that, he has all of the anguish and emptiness and memories, so it should be the same. It shouldn’t be different. 

But he stares at his reflection now and feels his stomach drop and his hands go numb, because this man isn’t that boy in the New York apartment, not physically. He’s worn away, worn down, like the mirage is finally beginning to wear off, the emotion and the memories and the dreams finally able to manifest itself into his body. Decaying it, feeding off it. Breaking him down bit by bit until there’s nothing left. He doesn’t know how long it will be until the memories start to fade, too, until he forgets. He doesn’t want to forget about her, despite it all. He doesn’t want to forget the good things. 

It shakes him. _You wanted this, didn’t you?_ He turns on the tap with an odd jerk, and the water sprays up into the sink, dots his wrists and his sleeves as he pointlessly washes his hands. _You wanted to let it go. You wanted to be someone else. Blank slate. Blank. Blank. Blank._ The water is freezing and his fingers tremble when he glances back up at himself.

_Empty._

He switches off the tap, breaths coming out short.

_Have you figured out who you are, yet?_

“Harry?”

Harry whirls, a hand on his chest, finally able to break his eyes away from his reflection. There’s a gentle knock from outside.

“You alright?” Louis asks, muffled.

“Fine,” Harry chokes. 

“Dinner’s ready,” Louis says, a little strained. Harry listens to the soft rise and fall of his retreating footsteps and squeezes his eyes closed. He presses his thumb and forefinger into the corners of them and tries to steady his breathing. 

Louis doesn’t say anything when Harry pads back out into the kitchen. He simply glances up from the steaming pot he’s serving from, and makes no comment on the ashen expression Harry’s sure he’s failed to hide, on the water clinging to his forearms, the dampness of his rolled up sleeves. He takes an awkward seat at the table, pulls in his chair, nods his thanks when Louis slides a warm plate in front of him and sits opposite, digging his fork straight through his food. 

When he notices Harry’s staring, he pauses, cheek half-ballooned with his first mouthful.

“Shit,” Louis mumbles, lowering his fork. He seems embarrassed. “Sorry. D’you, like. Do you say–”

“Oh.” Harry shakes his head, cheeks flaring. “No, I don’t–. No, I was just–”   

“Right,” Louis fumbles. “Sorry.”

“Sorry,” Harry echoes. They stare dumbly at each other. Louis sighs and rubs a slow hand across his forehead, leans his elbow on the table.

“I forget my manners,” he says quietly. “Not really used to eating with other people, sorry. So if you wanted to, like, say grace or whatever, or do what you do–”

“It’s fine,” Harry says. He can’t remember the last time he prayed for anything. He stopped that a while ago. “It’s really okay.”

“Okay.” Louis stabs at a soggy vegetable. 

“You don’t?” Harry asks softly, unsure if he should.

Louis shakes his head slowly. “I don’t believe in God.”  

“Oh,” Harry says. “Why?”

There’s a stretched, heavy silence. Louis cradles his cheek with his palm and looks out the window, then back down to his plate.

“I just don’t,” he says, trailing his fork through is dinner distractedly. Harry nods, stares down at his own plate and attempts to control his breathing.

“Me, either,” he says softly. “I think.” 

Louis doesn’t say anything else to that, just glances up for a flickering moment, then returns his attention back to his dinner, eating careful mouthfuls and staring out the window, like he can see through the darkness and the dusty shine the lamp leaves on the glass. Harry picks up his fork hesitantly. Just like the table, it too is chipped, silver scratched with thin little scars, one of the prongs slightly bent. 

The act of stabbing his fork into his food shouldn’t be as exhausting as it feels, but his shoulders are strung tight and his chest hurts and he could fall asleep here despite the goosebumps that are rising on his arms, seeking out the last few drops of chilly water that still dust his skin, despite the unfamiliarity of this place. He feels thin and weak and he can’t stop thinking about the way Louis had looked standing in the shadows, the way he’s taken Harry into his home, put a plate of food in front of him. Harry tries to remember the last time somebody else cooked for him and finds he can’t conjure up a single memory. 

“Harry,” Louis says, fork poised between his fingers delicately. He gestures between the plate and Harry’s mouth, a quick flick of his wrist. “Eat something, yeah? Please.”

It’s gentle, coaxing, but Harry still feels himself going pink. He ducks his eyes when he starts to eat, ignoring that way Louis is watching him. He tries not to wonder how Louis must see him if he can barely recognize himself, and he tries not to see this as an act of pity. He doesn’t think Louis is the kind of person to put pity on somebody else. So Harry eats, tries to, but he soon feels sick, bloated and full from actually putting something solid into his stomach, and he only gets through half the plate until his insides feel uncomfortably warm and he’s got a sticky flush along his neck, both from his exhaustion and the way Louis keeps glancing up at him, almost checking in. 

Instead of eating, Harry stares down at the table and follows the odd stains that litter it’s top, allows himself to be distracted by the few black, jagged scars that dent the wood, something murky yellow, a dark orange. There are parts hacked out of it, too, like cutlery has been dug into the grainy knots almost unconsciously. Harry traces a scattering of little scratches. It’s then, as he flicks his eyes in search for more, that he notices the tiny _L_ engraved into the lip of the wood in front of him. It’s a thin, delicate line. 

Harry blinks down at it, then slowly tilts his head, lets his eyes wonder. At the seat beside him, an _F_ is engraved, and further down, through the murky light, he can make out a _C_ at the last seat. 

Slowly, he brings his eyes back up to Louis, who’s dragging his fork through his food again. 

“Am I in your chair?” Harry asks. Louis looks up.

“What?”

“I just thought–.” Harry feels too warm. He thumbs over the small _L._ “The letters.” 

“Oh,” Louis swallows. “No, it’s–. It’s fine.”   

There’s a moment of silence, and then Louis stands abruptly, collects their plates and marches to the sink, turns the tap on with a chilly blast. The gurgle of the water fills the strained silence. Harry sinks into himself a little. He’s said the wrong thing, somewhere along the line, but he isn’t sure what. Watching the tense line of Louis’ shoulders as he starts to scrub at the pots, Harry lets his thumb fall away from the tiny marking like he’s been burned by it, and stands slowly to join Louis across the room.

“Here,” he says quietly, holding one hand out for the pot Louis is about to put into the drying rack, picking up a semi-damp washcloth with the other. Louis hands him the pot slowly, and Harry runs the cloth along the inside. “Where does this go?”

Louis points to one of the cupboards under the counter. 

They wash the dishes together without a word. Louis washes, the water getting soapy, bubbles clinging to his hands and his forearms, and then he hands off the shiny, chipped plates to Harry. They’re both methodical in their movements but Louis is stiff and silent and won’t look up from the water, jaw ticking. Harry stares at him, at the slick honey light that outlines his features. With the curtains open like this anyone could see in, just like he peers out across the harbour in the mornings to watch those little frontline kitchens slowly come to life.

It’s a moment of reflexiveness when he imagines himself on the beach, ankle deep in ice water and looking inward, past the frosty, hazy glass, the two of them side by side, thin and wrapped in too-big sweaters, stealing glances at one another. He feels it in his chest then, not warmth, it isn’t warmth yet, but it’s something akin to ease, just a tiny fraction of it among everything else. Gratitude. 

“Thank you, Louis,” Harry says. Louis finally looks at him, doesn’t look away.

“You don’t have to thank me,” he says softly. 

“I do,” Harry says, as earnest as he can manage. “You’re kind.” 

Louis braces his hands on the sink, hangs his head. “I’m not.” 

Harry’s eyes are misty and he doesn’t know why. His chest just aches and he wants things to be okay, just for a moment; he wants to look inside, look through the windows and see them both at ease, both comfortable. He’s reminded of that moment in the restaurant, of Louis’ closed eyes, his pause, his breath. That fierceness of feeling rushes through the gaps of his ribs.

“I think you are,” Harry says thickly. He’s trying to be brave. “Even if you don’t realize it.” 

Louis doesn’t deny it. He lets out a wet breath, almost a laugh, and finally turns to face Harry. Like this, the lamplight spills over his shoulders from behind, elongates him, makes him feel closer, and Harry sort of realizes it then, this feeling he has, the one that isn’t quite warmth. It might be safety, despite the coldness of his joints and the nervous flutter of his heart; the same type of safety he feels when he’s not safe at all out on that tiny boat, fighting the weather just for a few shiny fish. He’s not safe there, not in himself. He can’t trust himself to stay upright, to keep his feet. But he realizes slowly that he’s starting to trust Louis, and that in itself is equal parts terrifying and quietly exhilarating. 

“So are you,” Louis says, and Harry frowns gently. “So, I guess I should say thank you.” 

“Okay,” Harry breathes. 

Louis pulls the plug. They both watch the water spiral down into the sink. 

“Go get some rest, yeah?” Louis says. “Early start.” 

“Right,” Harry says. They pause, gazes caught on each other. Louis clears his throat and wipes his hands on his sweater, backs up from the sink a little. 

Harry is almost hesitant to step outside. Nighttime is thick and gluggy and the waves sound too loud in comparison to the quiet of inside. He tucks his face into his jacket, pauses at the top of the stoop. The light from inside is slanting outwards, and half of his body is dipped gold, the rest pressed flat against the bullet silver of moon. He inhales, takes in the salt and the sand, lets it fill his lungs, and starts to walk. 

“Harry, wait.”

Harry glances back over his shoulder. Louis’ expression flickers, like he hadn’t meant to let the words go, leant against the doorframe.

“Yeah?” Harry says. 

“Just,” Louis licks his lips, rolls his eyes to the sky before he brings them back down. “You’re welcome.” 

Harry tries not to hear the suggestion there, _you’re always welcome._

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says thickly, stepping down onto the sand.

“Bye.” 

Walking through the dark, listening to the waves crash and whisper and weep, Harry blinks to keep the hot swells in his own eyes at bay, and instead watches the refracting shift of the beach, dipping his boots into the foam that stretches to touch, and indulges himself in that wetness instead of the kind that’s threatening to flow onto his cheeks. For all his emptiness, the overwhelm that consumes him as he crosses the harbour makes him feel too full to breathe. 

-

Louis continues to guide him across the beach. 

Those late noons when Harry begins to drift on the sand, ready to slip behind the front line, Louis’ path doesn’t alter, and Harry finds himself trailing along quietly, scratching at the skin by his thumbs. At the table, Harry sits and watches Louis’ figure by the stove, and then they sit silently together, Louis flicking his gaze up every now and then to check that Harry is actually eating. They inhale the steam from their plates and sometimes their boots brush and all that lamplight bathes them dusty and warm, shut in from the howling wind, from the cold-snap that circles its brittle fingers around Cape Breton’s throat, one last squall of bitterness that’s going to bring snow any day now. 

Sometimes, Louis will go into the next room and put on a record. Harry hears his soft breath as he blows away dust, hears the rustle of feet on a rug and the thin vinyl sliding from its case, the little creak of the needle, the low hum before everything settles and the music begins. Elvis croons low and muffled, and the smooth baritone of his voice fills the space between them, bleeds burnt orange and slow when Louis returns to the kitchen, backlit by the lamp he flicked on in the living room. They wash the dishes together, soapy suds sticking to their hands, and Harry watches the flicker of Louis’ lashes as he scrubs at the pots until he gets caught watching and they both duck their heads again, letting the silence and the music from the next room fill the gaps. 

Stepping out into the night always feels like stepping into somewhere else, somewhere distant and disconnected from everything. It’s the same way he’d felt at the bar on that snowy night, trapped in that summer bubble, winter entering intermittently. When Louis says a soft _goodnight_ and the door closes behind him, all that warm light is suddenly sucked away. Harry stands on the sand and watches over his shoulder as the glossy lights behind the windows go out, turning the patches of sand lit darkest gold back to a chilling blue. Harry stands by the water and watches on until the house seems to blend back into the night and it’s not there at all, just a figment of his imagination. 

The lights in the house across the harbour are nothing like those dark, burnt colours that flush the floors and linger on the dust. Harry flicks on the lamp upstairs and stares at the coldness of it. It doesn’t seem to blend into anything, doesn’t illuminate the dust; instead it skims and prickles and floats like a shiny, metallic glaze. He isn’t sure if it’s always been that way or if he just tricked himself into finding a pretend warmth. Now that he’s had the real thing, flicking on the lamps here makes things feel clinical and distant and spine-tingling. There’s no sense of safety. Perhaps there never was. Perhaps he’s just finally learning how to differentiate between make believe and reality. 

-

In those hours they disappear from one another, Harry often finds himself waiting bundled up on the stoop, wondering where Louis fits in this empty, hostile little town. He wonders where he goes, wonders if he too is sitting by his window, in that broken rocking chair, watching the ocean shift and sway in the harbour and thinking of Harry, thinking reflexively back on himself too, if he’s just as chilled to the core as Harry seems to be when they part, when he’s left alone to mull with nothing but his own thoughts. 

The mornings are made for sitting together at the edge of the pier, their feet dangling, making short, quiet conversation while Louis smokes, until their words fall away so they can watch the feeble wobbling of morning trying to stand on fresh legs. They watch each other without really watching each other, sneaking those flickering glances until Louis raises a slow brow and stubs out his cigarette, both their cheeks pin-pricked pink from the cold wind.

It seems like an idle kind of curiosity, one that Harry is ever hesitant to explore. It doesn’t feel right to prod and poke and wedge his nails beneath the layers he has no right to try and pull away. But he feels himself flaking, like his skin is slowly wilting and with each glance he catches Louis giving him, the closer he might be to willingly letting himself shed, like maybe he could be safe and okay and untouchable. Sometimes, when they’re out on the boat, he’ll look up to find Louis’ eyes trained on his wrists or his jaw, observing the gaunt lines of his face, and sometimes their eyes catch and Louis will flinch his gaze back out to the water, and Harry thinks he understands that, knows that he does the same, has done since the first moment Louis pinned him down with the pale intensity of his own stare. 

They watch each other like that, back-and-forth, back-and-forth, quick and careful and it rattles Harry’s bones, makes him dizzy when he searches for the horizon and the waves crush them closer together.

So Harry waits on the stoop, he cradles the cracked spine of _The Spire_ in a careful palm, traces the faded lines with a careful finger until he gets lost in the yellowed pages, in the fuzz of thumbprints in the margin, and when he blinks back into himself darkness has begun it’s descent and he hopes for a glimpse of that winter-pink. Louis strolls up the beach, a speck in the distance, sometimes in an old fur-lined coat, stained deep brown, sometimes still in the shiny red coat, slick with seafoam as if he’s just come off the water. 

Harry often wonders if he has, most days. The first time they’d met, Louis said he tends to take _Arlo_ out in the afternoons, and Harry has realized that must be where he disappears to, out into the harbour until he’s blended with the ocean, as far away from the shore as little _Arlo_ can manage. Perhaps it’s an escape. It had sure felt like that, when Louis had pushed them from the pier, Sully and his crew watching on like sharks. Harry just doesn’t know what it is that Louis’ running away from, and it isn’t his place to pry, so he tries not to speculate like that. 

But he can’t help but feel as though they nothing about each other, nothing concrete, nothing they’ve admitted with words. Harry _knows_ Louis, but he doesn’t really know him. His hands still shake when vague shadows watch them from the kitchen window, when Sully sneers and spits and swears from the wharf, when the crew in the _Mary-Rose_ trail them like ghosts along the pier. Louis ignores it, he always ignores it, but Harry can’t. Harry feels pinned and trapped and like he’s going out of his mind because he thought that maybe they were staring to know each other. But, then he thinks of that day with the Sheriff, that night in the bar, the woman on the beach, all these small details that Harry knows mean something that he can’t figure out. 

He doesn’t know if he wants to figure it out. It isn’t his place. 

The snow is close. Harry’s teeth grind together as he waits on the edge of the pier this morning, his breath swirling in white clouds, and even the foamy peaks of the waves themselves seem diamond like and frozen, like slushy half-formed clumps of ice. It’s worse once they’re out on the water, each ocean spray like needles on their cheeks. Harry’s hands are pale blue, wet and bright pink on his palms from the nets, joints sore. His hood does nothing to shield him from the wind, and each breath is a bitter prickle that rattles down the back of his throat and floods his lungs. 

The waves are in a turmoil, whipped from underneath by Cape Breton’s tremulous heart, and _Arlo_ is slippery beneath their boots, seawater splashing and spraying and running in rivets. Harry’s pants are soaked and Louis doesn’t seem to be faring much better, his jaw locked and determined against the brittleness of the weather. There’s a hostility to his eyes, like he’s prepared to somehow fight the unknown force that’s lurking underneath the water, to make it calm. 

True to her nature, the ocean shows no signs of pity for them. Instead, _Arlo_ groans against the pull of the current when they lean in to pull up the net, and almost like a punishment, like the little Cape Islander is praying _no more, no more_ , the bump of a rogue wave hits the bow, spraying and flooding over into the deck in a foamy explosion. Harry is coated, the water landing icy and brutal along his back, dripping into his hair and down his neck, entire body soaked, and he rears up so suddenly from the feel of it that the front of his sweater catches, yarn pulling into a neat split down the centre of his chest. 

The water feels so cold that it’s almost hot, so chilled that it burns, leaves wakes of prickling where it rolls in pearls down the back of his coat. All the seawind sneaks against his skin, prying into the new hole in his sweater and scratching its hands along his damp undershirt. It punches a breath out of him and he drops the net, Louis jolting forward a little with the weight of it, managing to catch himself. 

He disregards it the second he catches sight of Harry, who’s got both his palms folded flat against his chest, taking in quick, shaky breaths. Harry sees it, the moment Louis’ expression flickers as he drops the net and advances, takes hold of Harry’s wrists and pulls them away. Harry flinches, stumbles backward in alarm, but Louis is wide-eyed and almost frightened.

When he realizes that it’s just a tear in clothing, not skin, Louis’ entire face flames, both of them freezing as they stare at each other. Louis’ fingers are still looped around Harry’s wrists.

He takes a step back and blinks his eyes away.

“Sorry,” he says, jaw ticking. “I thought…”

Harry’s skin tingles with goosebumps, flushed hot-cold in the places Louis’ fingers had been.

“I–.” Louis rubs a violent hand over his mouth and looks away, takes a moment of pause. A wave sprays foam up to them again, salty pinpricks that dot their coats. Harry shakes against the cold air. “I’m sorry. I know you don’t like to be touched.”

Harry’s entire heart falls through his chest in a feeble heap. He almost makes an aborted sound, a hurt lump torn from his throat, but he remains silent and shivering, unsure of how to even begin responding to that. Heat prickles his eyes and he looks away, looks down to his chest. His sweater hangs loose and defeated, green yarn unspooling it’s threads. There’s no words for the weight that’s curled a fist into his stomach, pushing and pushing, dragging his body down. Louis is still silent, looking out to the water, and Harry closes his eyes for a moment, attempts to breathe through the memory of Louis’ hands on his shoulders, the warmth of his body, the lingering, accidental touches that have felt so intimate because Harry hasn’t had that touch in so long. 

He doesn’t know if it’s possible to miss something he never really had, to crave the impressions of a memory, but it feels like he could. Maybe that’s what this is, this sudden sickly pressure to his chest at Louis’ words; missing, craving, hoping. Allowing himself to want and wish for something akin to a friend, for a touch of something akin to comfort. Safety and trust and belonging. 

There had been something else in Louis’ expression though, that flicker of alarm when Harry had looked down to see his ripped clothing and almost imagined red blossoming there. He wonders if Louis saw it, too. If they both had that lurching moment of thinking they’d failed their seemingly silent promise to distantly look out for each other.

They remain silent on the battle back to the wharf, little _Arlo_ shuddering painfully through the choppy harbour. Harry’s teeth hurt from being pressed so tightly together against the wind, curled into himself completely to try and shield his damp chest from the rushes of cold air that sweep off the waves. The squalls are high-pitched whistles, starting to carry thin sleet, and he just wants steady ground to stand on, for Louis to stop flicking his gaze over every few seconds. For Louis to never stop watching him.

 _Mary-Rose_ is tucked comfortably against her slip when they pull in. The crew are drenched and heaving buckets out onto the wharf, white clouds swirling from the deck in thick bundles. Sully is standing and observing, the puff of his breath tainted by cigarette smoke, and he turns to watch as Harry and Louis tie _Arlo_ up with frosty fingers. Harry catches the edge of of Sully’s smirk as he climbs up onto the pier, something nasty that becomes obscured by smoke.

“Come on,” Louis says quietly. Harry follows close behind him, keeps his arms tucked over his chest and his head down. 

There’s no avoiding the confrontation. 

“Mornin’,” Sully calls. He stamps out his cigarette under his boot and watches as they approach, eyebrows climbing. He lets out a low whistle. “Fought tooth and nail, huh, skipper?”

Harry ignores it, sticks close by Louis as they start to weave past barrels and tubs of rope. He tries to avoid looking at the rigid bodies of the fish, their slimy, petrified eyes. 

“Jesus, what’d you do to him, Tomlinson?” Sully says, lingering after them, heavy boots thudding alongside _Mary-Rose._ “Told you to watch out, didn’t I, skip.”

Harry can see how tense Louis’ movements are, but he doesn’t rise to the bait, just keeps walking with his jaw clenched, fingers curled into fists in his pockets. Sully is still following them, and when Harry makes the mistake of glancing back over his shoulder, he wishes he hadn’t. The look in Sully’s eye is something feral and full of dark mirth, tainted with this disgust and hostility that makes Harry’s skin prickle. He stops following them, once their eyes meet, and he gives Harry a tiny nod of his head, like he’s tipping a hat, grin widening. Cold air escapes from the gaps between his yellow teeth.

“See ya, skipper!” 

Their bodies bump when Harry hurries to look away, his shoulder knocking gently into Louis’ back. Louis doesn’t flinch, just slows a little until they’re side by side and their boots meet the damp sand. The waves are rough and break up the shore, fizzle and try to reach out with dark fingers. There’s only a soft strip of milky light on the horizon, the rest of the sky shrouded and thunder-dark with thick cloud. The sleet drips down through thin cracks and slips down their spines. Harry focuses on the puff of their breaths to try and distract himself from the brittle chill gripping his bones.

He doesn’t question it when Louis leads them up the stoop. The rocking chair and the windows are creaking against the sea wind, and the draft sweeps through the whole house when the door is opened, fluttering the curtains and making the wood shiver. Harry ducks inside after Louis and unclenches his jaw. It’s not quite warm, but there’s a safety in finally being out of the wind. 

“I’ll put the kettle on,” Louis says softly. He shucks his own coat and hangs it on one of the rusty hooks, then holds a palm out for Harry’s. 

His limbs feel sluggish and sticky when he slips it off. Something settles in his chest when he looks at the two coats hanging there together, red and yellow and stained, still shiny with seawater. At his chest, his sweater is still gaping open, almost split entirely down the centre now, and the navy of his undershirt has turned ebony and dark, still damp and clinging to his skin. Silently, he follows Louis into the kitchen and watches the lines of his figure as he reaches for the kettle, watches the way the dark clouds frame him through the window while he fills it with gushing water.

The stove clicks, gas catches flame, and Louis shakes out the match. They watch the smoke rise together.

“C’mon.” Louis brushes past him. “You must be freezing.”

Harry simply stares after him for a moment, when Louis starts down the hall. He’s hesitant to follow, mainly because Louis seems just as hesitant to lead, fingers resting on the knob of the door at the end of the hall. They regard each other quietly for a moment. Louis looks almost afraid, this expression of _can I trust this with you_ , this held breath, and Harry tries to answer. _You can trust me_. _I’ll be gentle._

The door creaks as it opens, and the floorboards under Harry’s feet creak in turn. 

It feels empty, the room, holds that same strange void that the rest of the house captures. All of the furniture has been placed along the same wall. A single bed with a rusty iron frame and tired sheets left unmade. An ashtray overflowing with dead cigarettes on the wonky bedside table, sat atop a black-bound book. A cracked mug. A dusty lamp. A tiny wooden desk with a metallic, cold typewriter positioned in the centre, thin little slips of yellow paper pinned to the wall behind it, short cursive and pages from books. Another ashtray on the desk. A tiny inset cupboard that’s half-open and a tangled mess of shelves and fabric and taped up boxes. 

Through the dirty window, the grey slate of the cliffside makes the world outside seem mirage like. Thin curtains hug the frame, almost translucently cream. There’s this fine powder of dust coating the unused corners of the room, and Harry can almost imagine there are footprints that have made marks on the floorboards from familiar steps, from an unwavering path between the bed and the cupboard. It’s dark, cold, so completely still. 

Harry blinks away from the scrunched sheets and looks to the most prevalent object in the room. The bookcase is tall and wide, stuffed to the brim with cracked spines. There’s hardly an inch of space left between the catastrophe of different colours and shapes, and Harry stares up at it, breathes in that dust smell that’s so different to the rest of the room, the kind that hides in the margins and warms itself, turns distinct. He can smell it even from here, the memories cradled in all those pages. 

There are thin novels, unintelligible collections, hardbound books that look weighted, that look almost like academia with their gold-flaked lettering. It’s a little overwhelming to see this, this quiet, private place. There’s something so paused about it, like the world outside doesn’t really exist anymore, like time has stopped. Harry looks out the window again, to where the cliffs obscure the view of the sky, and even with the sleet and the wind, all of it seems muffled and non-existant. 

“Here.”

Harry flinches. Louis is standing half in the small cupboard, his arm outstretched. There’s a white undershirt in his hand, a thick sweater that’s all dark maroon. He looks slightly put out, nervous and unsure, refusing to meet Harry’s eye. 

Harry trails his gaze upward. There are shelves full of dark clothes, jackets and sweaters that haven’t been hung, and then above that, dusty cardboard boxes that have all been taped and labeled, huge stacks of loose yellow-edged paper. It all looks like it hasn’t been touched for years. The door closes with an abrupt click. Harry flicks his eyes back to Louis, embarrassed with his staring when he takes the clothes carefully. 

“It didn’t scratch you, did it?”

“No,” Harry says. 

Louis nods and looks down at his feet. Harry can almost feel it, this strange sense of guilt that holds Louis’ posture stiff. He’s uncomfortable, unsure. Harry sees Sully’s slimy smile again, his jeers, and he curls his fingers into the soft fabric and fails to stop himself staring at where the storm-light shines over Louis’ scarred cheek.

“Did they do that to you?” Harry asks softly. He feels on the verge of tears.

Louis shakes his head.

“What happened?”

“I was younger. I was–. _We_ ,” Louis takes in a breath, works his jaw as he glances up and out the window to the grey nothingness. “My friend and I were on the wharf when we weren’t supposed to be. A hook got swung into my cheek and ripped it open.”

“That’s awful,” Harry whispers. “I’m sorry.”

“Shit happens, doesn’t it,” Louis says. He inhales, rolls his shoulders back and finally looks at Harry. “I don’t really…I don’t notice it anymore. You learn to live with people staring at you, I guess.” 

“I think it’s unique.” 

Louis looks down at his feet again and shrugs, but it’s feeble and small, and Harry tries not to register that there’s a wetness to Louis eyes that he’s trying to blink away. The kettle starts to whistle from the kitchen and Harry’s veins feel cold and he doesn’t know what to say or do to make this better but he just knows that somewhere deep in his chest he might care too much now, that the reason he finds himself staring down into his drawers and staring down into his empty bag and not being able to move his feet is because he can’t ever leave this place without the terrifying urge to know Louis completely, to know him more than Harry knows himself. 

“You should change,” Louis says softy, drifting to the door and not looking back. “I’ll start on the tea.”

The door closes behind him and Harry is left staring at the dark wood. His body feels mechanical as he slowly pries his ruined sweater over his head, then his sticky undershirt. The air is cool and mouths at his chest. When he slips on Louis’ sweater, he almost pauses with it still over his head, his own breath reflecting back onto his chin. The fabric smells somehow familiar, that kind of dustiness that used to hide itself in Harry’s favourite clothes as a child, the jumpers and shirts that would remain untouched in his drawers for months because he was scared of spoiling them. When he finally did wear them, when he slipped them over his head, they’d hold this same scent, this odd warmth that shouldn’t be comforting but is, like it’s been stored and waiting eagerly for him to reach out and touch.

Finally, he pulls the sweater over his head. It’s chunky and heavy and a little too small, but it’s stretched out around his hands, thick cuffs brushing his knuckles. The collar hugs close to his neck, a fuzziness that tickles his jaw, and he stands there for a moment simply staring down at himself and trying to will away the fake warmth that he’s imagining. He scoops up his own clothes from the back of the desk chair and makes to leave on soft feet, but he pauses by the door, looks up and down the bookcase again.

It’s the smell that draws him in. He traces a gentle finger over the spines, dust catching and floating upward. There are so many, some held together with tape, the covers and pages bloated from seawater much like the books that Louis has stored on _Arlo_. The house creaks gently against the wind, and there are gentle sounds from down the hall, the water running again in the kitchen. Harry runs his pointer fingers slowly along the spines, feels the textures and the bumps, head tilted to skim the titles.

He pauses.

It couldn’t possibly be, but it is, the second _B_ half hidden behind his finger. The spine is bent and dark, the same as he remembers it. It’s with a slow, measured movement that he tucks his finger along the top of the book and gradually pulls it half-out of the stack. It’s the same weather-beaten edition he had, and a swell of melancholy fuzzes up through his bones and makes his teeth ache. 

Gently, Harry slides _Black Beauty_ from the shelf and cradles it in careful palms. 

He simply stares at it for a moment. Then, he flicks the pages between his thumb, lets them flutter and flicker quietly, the smell finally drifting upward from the dented margins. He feels heady with it, feels dazed and doused in a thick wave of memories, and he almost lets himself lower to the ground, press his back to the wall and press the book to his face so he can inhale the words that were once read to him on those soft nights, all lantern glow and honey in hot water and the paddocks hazy out the window, his mother’s hands light in his hair, care in her voice when she used to whisper. 

He flicks through the first few pages carefully and thumbs over the words there, eyes growing hot. _I hope you will grow up gentle and good_. 

“Harry?” Louis knocks gently, opens the door a crack.

Harry’s chest balloons with a sudden rush of air, an awkward _yeah?_ tumbling from his lips. He tries to clumsily slip the book back into the shelves but Louis sees, Harry knows he sees. There are tears blurring his eyes that weren’t there before and there’s a shock of heat running from his wrists up to his arms, all this nervous, shaky energy at having been caught snooping through things that don’t belong to him. 

They simply stare at each other for a moment. Louis’ eyes drift over Harry’s chest, down to his hands, back up to his face, a quick flicker to the bookcase. 

“I know that we don’t usually, um,” Louis trails off, drums his fingers lightly on the door. He inhales a small breath. “I was going to light the fire, if you wanted to stay for a while? Just until the weather calms down a little.”

“Oh,” Harry says. His voice sounds strange. “Yeah. Thank you.”

Louis nods. Drums his fingers on the door again. He gestures towards the bookcase, a little hesitant.“You can grab something, if you want.”

Harry glances to where _Black Beauty_ is half poking out from the rest of the shelf. 

“Tea’s in the living room when you’re ready,” Louis says, starting to lean back out into the hall. He gives Harry a gentle smile, a soft tease. “Pick something for me, too. Make it good, though.”

Harry stares after him as he goes. In the stillness, he looks back to the dusty shelves and levels _Black Beauty_ with a pause. He isn’t sure if it’ll hurt more to pull the book from its place and trace familiar pages, or to leave it and allow himself to toss and turn all night thinking of all the ways he could have revelled and somehow found comfort in the memories of things that have passed. He slides the book into his hands slowly, then reaches for the one next to it. There are too many titles to sort through now, to worry himself over. _Lord of the Flies_ lands atop _Black Beauty_. 

The fire is a gentle smoulder when Harry peeks into the living room. With the curtains half-parted, the stormlight filters in a soft pulse from the pane, gradually splitting and spreading in a milky beam along the floor and the furniture. It ignites dust, catches the tips of hair on the back of Louis’ head where he’s crouched in front of the bricks, flaky wood dusted around his socked feet. There are two teacups on the table, ancient fine china-white with gold trim, a pack of cigarettes discarded between them. The ashtray is still smoking lightly, and the room smells of it faintly, too, mixing with the dark wood that Louis is feeding gradually into the fire, letting it grow.

Soon, he becomes outlined in dull amber, and only when he looks over his shoulder does Harry finally move to take a hesitant seat on one side of the couch. It’s drab, as is the rest of the room, all dark wood that’s begun to fade and is full of rough knots. There are no pictures on the mantle, only dreary copper candle holders. Louis already has a record spinning quietly, half-lost under the crackle of the fire and the pittering of the sleet against the windows. It’s croony and deep, something low with brass. 

Harry places _Lord of the Flies_ in front of Louis’ cup, then reaches for his own, taking a slow sip. It’s a herbal brew, something woody and smokey and heavy in his chest when he inhales the soft steam still rising from the rim. For a moment, he’s able to sink entirely back into the cushions and just breathe. Louis’s sweater has bunched up around his wrists, cuffs higher around his neck now that he’s sitting. It’s warm. 

The couch dips.

“Good choice,” Louis says lightly, reaching for his book. The cover is half-ripped off, Harry notices now, the bottom of the spine missing so that it reads _Lord of t_. Only half the stem of the _h_ remains. Louis takes a long sip of his tea, and his next words a muffled when he wipes at his top lip. “What did you pick?”

Harry holds up _Black Beauty._ The way Louis pauses as he reaches forward to put his tea onto the coffee table makes Harry’s stomach curl. He flicks his eyes from Harry’s face to the book, back again. Clears his throat.

“Have you read it before?”

“A few times.” _Hundreds of times_. 

“It’s good,” Louis nods. He’s fiddling with the cover of his own book. 

“I really love it,” Harry admits. Louis glances up at him after, a slight raise to one eyebrow.

“Yeah?” he says. He has his tea cradled in his hands again, and his smile falls over the lip of his cup.

“Yeah,” Harry says. “It’s been with me for a long time.”

“I stole that from a library,” Louis says, and it’s so blunt, so unabashed that Harry’s lips quirk, this odd jolt of a laugh huffing out through his nose.

“Why?” 

Louis’ smile wans slightly. He looks away to the window, sets his tea back on the coffee table. “My sisters loved it too much to leave it there.” 

Harry nods slowly and lets the silence settle around them. The fire is alive and dancing now, and it bathes them partly in a rosy film of orange, cradles them close despite the way they’re tucked into opposite corners of the little couch. There’s another adjacent to them, an armchair in the corner, and the rooms size opens itself up, then, the same way the dining table and the hallway and the rest of the house has done. 

“Do they still live around here?” Harry asks cautiously, unsure if he should. “Your sisters, I mean.” 

“No,” Louis says softly. He flicks open _Lord of the Flies_ and dog-ears a page. Unfolds it. Refolds it. The firelight catches the tips of his lashes. “They’re in Ontario now.”

Harry doesn’t know how long they read in silence for. He begins _Black Beauty_ right from the start, toes curling against the floor as the fire slowly heats the room. He lets himself sink back, his figure obscured in the sweater, and his bones go heavy and sleep-filled. The only sound is the crackle of the wood and the wind on the stoop, the soft, intermittent flutter of a page being turned. They’re mirrored, and it’s peaceful, and Harry feels both comforted and half-close to tears by the words he reads. Maybe it’s cathartic, or some form of subtle self-destruction. Soon, he finds himself numb and thumbing over the pages gently, not really reading anymore, just feeling the texture of the paper and inhaling the deep smell of the fire with a thickness in his throat and chest that won’t quite budge.

“Look.”

Louis’ voice is a gentle whisper. He stands and crosses the room, pulls back the curtains and lets the last of the grey light topple in.

Harry rises slowly. His bones are all fuzzy from heat. Outside, soft snowfall has begun to blur the beach, making the lights around the harbour seem distant and foggy. Late morning has cracked the remainder of the sky in two. Harry reaches out for the window pane and feels the chill of it, a pinprick that shoots up his veins and feels like a trickling stream amongst the warmth from the fire.

“Last snow of the season,” Louis says, peering down along the harbour. His eyes are icy, and the gentle light catches on his scar, turns it shiny in the same way the snow does when it starts to melt, that special low-diamond sheen.

“It’s quite beautiful,” Harry says, because it is, despite all the sharp, hostile wind and Cape Breton’s thrashing sea, the dangerous waves and the squalls and the pelting rain that’s left them frozen. Observing it now, there’s a sublime sort of beauty to it all that he didn’t quite see before, that he only managed to glimpse in the undertoned pinkness of the cliffs. Maybe it’s been here all along.

“Quite,” Louis mimics. 

Harry huffs a soft laugh and looks at his toes, jaw warming. “I don’t sound like that.”

“Sure, sailor,” Louis says offhandedly, and goes back to looking at the snow. 

-

The last fall coats Cape Breton soft and pillowy white. Mountain tops dusted, all the low greens there turned a crystal olive, something that seems nearly translucent from far away; and then the water, the ocean shot through hollow at the shore, dark and deep where the waves turn to nothing more than gushing white caps. The sand is damp and slick, wharf like a glossy little candle in the mornings when flakes of white are still trembling down, all of it a snow globe, domed in a glassy, sleepy glaze.

There’s little refuge from the chill, from the pin-prick feeling that curls down Harry’s neck out on the boat, _Arlo_ turning eggshell pale under the milky morning light, hands blue-veined, purple at the wrist, their coats like gems cut out from under marble, stark against their surroundings. Frost makes things slippery and sheened and hard to define, wind whistling its little tune through the rivets it makes in the cliffs, sneaking up along the frontline and sneaking it’s way under doors, through windows, so brittle that Harry wakes each morning with hollow bones, toes so numb it feels as though they’re dipped in ice water. 

He sleeps fully clothed, blankets piled up, coats on top of that, the left side of his body going numb because the act of turning over to the right lets the chill in again, cheek almost sticking to the pillow from the sharpness of it. He tends to wait under _Arlo_ ’s shelter in the morning, the pier slick with melting snow, thumbing his way gently through worn, stiff pages until he hears the familiar thud of Louis’ boots, that dusty-warm cigarette smell. 

Even basked in the low light of the fire, tea cupped between his palms, the cold snap still manages to trace it’s fingers under the cuffs of his clothes, a phantom breath on the back of his neck. Louis feels it too, Harry knows, the two of them with their bodies buried in the cushions late at night, listening to the soft flurry of flakes that brush the window, waiting for the spell to pass. Perhaps it serves as a reminder that a change in season won’t mean a change in weather just yet, that the cold chill is here to stay for a little while longer, Cape Breton not yet done with it’s thrashing sea and sprinkles of sleet. 

This persistent chill finds them back at the bar, on the odd night, though it’s somewhat reluctant, this hesitance from both of them to be near others. But then they’re in that small booth and the alcohol feels a little like a liquid heat when it starts to hit, and it becomes easier to draw away from the chill. To be drowsy and lax and tucked away, their knees lightly brushing, leaves Harry lulled just for a few hours, just for the time he has whiskey in his palms, a quiet hush around them when he’s able to drown out the familiar music and lose himself in the pages in front of him, and a few times, drunkenly, distantly, flicking his gaze over Louis’ face, the line of his nose and the shape of his brows and the haze of his scar before he blinks his eyes back to his glass.

Tonight the bar is a beehive buzz, stools all occupied, swells of laughter and the cracking of cues ever present. It had started as a quiet evening, just the low record fuzz and the clink of glass, a radio hum from behind the bar. Harry can barely hear his own thoughts now, but maybe that’s a good thing. He doesn’t quite know. He’s a few drinks deep and it’s spread gluggy and hot through his arms, turning them jelly-like, body almost falling supine against the wall. Across from him, Louis’ fingers are curled around his book, jaw twitching each time a shout goes up by the snooker table, the abrupt slam of a glass, the icky chill each time the door opens and lets through that sly whistle. 

Harry’s eyes drift hazily. The crew of the _Mary-Rose_ are gathered at the snooker table, and by the corner of the room Sully has his arm slung around a woman's shoulders, her belly protruding, her own palm flat and comforted over the swell there. There are a few kids running circles around the tables, playful when they pass their fingers over cue balls and empty the little nets, Sully scolding them when they get in the way. Harry watches curiously, this strange sensation taking over his body. It’s just odd, to see a man like Sully with children around him, a wife staring lovingly at the underside of his chin. He thinks of the gaggle of children they saw on the beach, the little groups they tend to nestle into, almost like a pack. 

“I didn’t know Sully has kids,” Harry says, mouth working before his brain does, words slow and a little stilted.

Louis glances up at him from under his brows. “Five boys, and another one on the way.”

“Oh,” Harry says. He thumbs at the side of his glass.

“You seem surprised,” Louis comments, attention diverted back to his book.

“I guess I…don’t see him as the fatherly type,” Harry says, but Louis’ mouth twitches and he looks up again, that shifting amusement working at the corners of his eyes.

“You and me both,” he says. He glances over his shoulder minutely. “They’re good kids, though. Smart.”

“What about you?” Harry says.

“Me, what?” Louis says, turning back to Harry. The quirk of his mouth is gone, replaced instead with something sombre.

“Have you thought about, you know,” Harry shrugs, trying to be delicate, because this somehow feels delicate, feels like something he isn’t sure to ask, not with the way Louis’ looking at him, the bend of his fingers in the pages, “having kids. A family.”

Louis bites at the side of his cheek, eyes shifting down. With a sigh, he sits back and lets his book fall to the table. “Do you ever feel like you’re living life backwards?”

Harry stares back at him, knees touching. “How do you mean?”

“Most of the couples here, they’ve got a full house and then some, y’know?” Louis says, gaze lowered. “This entire town is made up of extended families. And everyone knows everyone, and you grow up here always knowing that you’ll have a sibling, another person close to your age, a parent.”

The sound of the bar is washed out, hazy and hushed like the swell. Louis picks at the edge of the table, mouth pinched.

“I had that for a little while, but that growth, it’s…” he trails off, and Harry can hear the tick of his nail against the woodgrain. “I guess it just didn’t last. I always had people around me as a kid, from the second I was born. Our house was a tin of sardines.” 

“What happened?” Harry says. Louis glances up at him, looks away again as he swallows.

“People change,” he says softly. “Sometimes not for the better. It was sort of nailed into my head that I’d have a family, have sons to take out on the boat, to show them everything, but I…I’ve been on my own for so long now. Maybe it’s too late.”

“It’s not,” Harry says, throat tight. “There’s always time.”

Louis shrugs, dejected. “In two years I’ll be thirty. There were seven of us in that house by the time my mom turned twenty-five.”

“But–”

“Harry,” Louis says, head down. “I don’t really want to talk about it.”

“I’m sorry,” Harry says, suddenly flushed. He feels sick, invasive, this quiet rush of shame heating his cheeks

“It’s alright, it’s just…” Louis makes a vague gesture with his hand, smile wan and sad. “I’ve made my peace with it.”

He reopens his book then, after a stuttered, strange pause between them. Harry’s fingers curl in his lap, tucked tight together, this squirmy, odd feeling settling in his stomach. It works it’s way up into his chest, becomes a dull ache, and he watches with half-wet eyes as Louis turns a page and rests his scarred cheek in his palm. A round of raucous laughter cuts through the static, the giddy, shrill squeal of a child, and Harry inhales, closes his eyes for a moment.

“I was an only child,” he says quietly, unsure if Louis’ even heard him, “and I don’t really remember my dad.”

Louis pauses, looks up slow.

“So I understand, I think,” Harry continues. He shrugs minutely and ducks his head. “That feeling. Waiting for something to change.” 

He can’t say more, finds that the very thought of even opening up his chest like that has fear and hurt soaring through him. He can’t say he hardly remembers his mother, either, the parts of her that were really her, when he was young, when they were all young, when he skipped pebbles and ran through fields and things didn’t seem so impossibly heavy and huge. He can’t say that he’s never felt companionship, that he’s never felt that sardine press, that he’s always wondered and wanted and hoped for something like it, but ultimately knew he’d never have it. 

“How old are you?” Louis asks.

“Twenty-two,” Harry says, after a beat. The fact that he has to think about the answer to that question makes his skin prickle, those lost years blurring the edges of time. 

“Hm,” Louis’ mouth twitches up into that wistful smile again, gaze darting from Harry down to his book. He dog ears a page, pressed against the fold. “Just older than my youngest sisters. Twins, they are.”

“Do you get on?”

“I haven’t spoken to them in two years,” Louis says, fingers tracing the tabletop in a gentle circle. “I send letters, now and again, but. We don’t really call.”

“I’m sorry,” Harry says. “I don’t want to pry.”

“It’s alright,” Louis says, voice a whisper. “I do think about them quite often, wonder how they’re getting on, you know.”

“You don’t think they’d want you to call?” Harry asks. They’re speaking so softly, both fidgeting, searching for distraction. Harry’s glass is empty and he wishes it were full, wishes he had something to hide his quiet curiosities behind, wishes he had something to hold so he isn’t tempted to reach out and brush Louis’ wrist, to offer these soft comforts, the same way he used to try in that tiny, cramped apartment.

“I did speak to Felicite a few months ago,” Louis says, mouth twisting. “She wanted to visit, but I–. I was too busy with the boat.”

He doesn’t looked convinced by his own voice, and Harry doesn’t say anything at first, just let’s Louis talk, because his chest has started to move with uneven breaths, this twitch in his fingers when he scratches at his beard.

“It’s just been a long time,” Louis says. “It’s been too long.”

The bar is all lush orange and honey brushes, these swoops that catch the edges of Louis’ face, his lashes, shadows that make the cut of his eyes seem distant, and Harry can tell his mind is far away, would know the slack of his hands anywhere, that feeling of a memory crawling up the spine and latching on before you can blink. He lets Louis go, his eyes downcast where he flicks at his dog-eared page, and then Harry takes in a breath.

“Maybe it’d be nice,” he says, “to see them again.”

He hopes Louis reads his intent, feels it when he slowly meets Harry’s eye again. He’d give anything to go back to a time when he had at least one person around him, that boyish daze of simplicity, the sun through a window, a candle on the table, a palm cupped gentle around the back of his head; and he knows that in all forms, that simplicity has to fade, that the floating, forgotten moments of childhood may never truly carry into the next stage of a life. But to rekindle the details, to feel a warm nostalgia instead of that achy, fuzzed cold, that in itself is something he wishes he could find again. 

He can’t. Those times are dead and gone and lost with the wind, lost in the wisps of hair he cut from his head, lost in the key twisting in the lock, the pages he left behind, the seafoam, the sand, the gentle wash of a tear. But Louis could. And Harry doesn’t know what comes over him in that moment, something foreign and new, but it feels important, and warm, and akin to a breath of care.

“Maybe,” Louis says. Their eyes don’t waver, locked together in something deeper. A sudden moment of translucence. “Maybe.”

-

When the snow finally calms days later, it’s with a bleary, gentle wave goodbye, a sun-flare flicker that overlaps the water in the early morning. A tiny, peeking glimmer of spring. Though that navy blue still remains, hugging the underside of distant clouds and casting shadows, the slit of sky that remains open as the sun rises is clearer, the swell and the rhythm of the water losing some of its rumbling franticness. 

It’s a sweet relief after a week of brittleness, of shuddering hands and silver sleep, and Harry finds that walking along the beach on this morning has him pausing, watching the soft sweep of the thin waves and that mellow beam of light starting to pulse at the horizon. Just like a part in a curtain, that soft hallway glow under the slip of the door, the emerging sun appears as a thin strip of almost white, the gurgling dark of the ocean below, the heavy hang of clouds overhead. A portal to another world. It draws colours in the water, new shades of emerald and burgundy and a paler blue revealing themselves in the spread of the wake. That gentle underbelly pink.

He sits by the edge of the pier again, what’s left of the snow melting away and reduced to tiny little diamonds. Feet overhanging the water, _Arlo_ nudging the edge of the pier almost silently, a new, different kind of calm settles across Harry’s shoulders. The wind is just a whisper, and when the waves hit the beams of the pier, the spray brushes the soles of his boots, leaving his cheeks dry, the wisps of hair that have started to curl at his temples untouched and untangled. He looks down at the sea, then back out to the horizon line, mulled and quiet while the rest of the wharf buzzes with movement.

There’s still that chill, still that nibble of biting cold, but it’s calm, and Harry finds he doesn’t mind the freshness of it. He closes his eyes and breathes in the sea-salt smell, all consuming, and when he opens his eyes again the disk of the sun has started to rise properly, a halo-like glow skimming towards him atop the water. It’s mesmerizing to see such a clear day here. Hands in the pockets of his coat, feet swaying, he’s lulled by it, breath held, watching the half-disk appear.

It isn’t until the sunlight has started to blend with the dark clouds, finally tinting the Cape Breton blue Harry knows, that he realizes his thighs are numb, back sore from being hunched over so long, and that all the slips along the wharf are empty save for one. He glances to a still sleeping _Arlo_ , then out to the sea. Back again, gaze trailing up the edge of the silent, still wharf. It’s late morning, now. 

Louis is nowhere to be seen.

Gingerly, Harry rises to his feet and loops his arms around his stomach. He looks at _Arlo_ again. The little boat bumps the pier, ropes pulling as it drifts out to the water before swinging back in again with a barely audible creak. Along the frontline, the orange glow of kitchen light is familiar, each little home dotted with it, aged wood supple and glazed in this new type of sunlight. Harry casts his gaze to his right, to the very edge of the cliffside in the distance, the stoic house that rests there. 

Along the beach, children are dotted like ants among the sand, an elderly man walking his dog by the shore. This is a sight he’s used to seeing when they bring _Arlo_ back in, when they’re already rain-wet and haggard and he has this urge to disappear. But seeing it now, watching the casual simplicities of townsfolk, it feels like a spanner thrown between a finally working pair of cogs, a malfunction of some kind, and Harry starts back up the pier on swift feet.

The sand is damp and folds under his fast footsteps, cold air seeping down into his lungs as he crosses the stretch of the beach. He feels lightheaded, and he isn’t sure if it’s the sudden rush of movement in his frail bones, the flurry of the sand, or if it’s something else, something deeper, this quiet whisper of fear and unease. It pulls at his gut, the thought that Louis’ absence could mean that something has happened, but even the absence alone, just the thought of waiting for something that may never come back, strikes a hot pulse of a memory into his head before he can clamp down on it.

He falters at the stoop when he reaches the house. The wind has started to pick up a little, brushes his hair forward and into his ears, almost pushing him up the creaking stairs with phantom hands. Hesitantly, he places his palm to the banister, takes in a breath, and pulls himself up to the doorway.

He knocks three times, a short wrap of his knuckles.

There’s a muffled sound from inside, a chair scraping, maybe, and then the lock clicks and Harry feels his face falter at the unfamiliar figure peering out at him. It’s a young woman, dark hair and pale eyes – and that’s all it takes for it to click, the sharpness of her features, the light, stark blue. She stares out at him, flicks her gaze from his scuffed boots to his coat and then back to his face.

“Who are you?” she says, opening the door a little wider and glancing up towards the wharf.

“Um. I’m Harry,” Harry says awkwardly. “I’m a friend of Louis’?”

The girls eyebrows raise at that, the scrutiny still edging the lines of her mouth and eyes. “A friend. Of Louis’.”

“Um–”

“He’s busy,” the woman says. There’s the sound of shuffling feet behind her, two more unfamiliar voices drifting down the hall. 

“Oh,” Harry says softly. “Okay. I was just, um. Just coming to check in. We usually go out on the boat in the mornings so I–”

“Of course you’re one of them,” the woman spits, and Harry blinks wildly at the disgust in her eyes, the shrivel of her mouth. “All you lot think about is that damn _boat_.”

“I’m not–”

“Been back a _day_ and it’s already started…”

She closes the door on his face as she talks, the end of her sentence trailing away until all Harry is left with is the scuffle of retreating feet and a low, unimpressed mutter. He stands there for a moment, unsure of what to do. He’s dumbstruck and his hands feel jittery when he pushes them down into his pockets and manages to turn away. It’s as he steps back onto the sand that he hears the door creak again.

“Harry?”

Louis appears at the top of the stoop, and Harry glances back to him, cheeks flushing when their eyes meet. He isn’t sure why he feels embarrassed at being here; he doesn’t want to come across as needy, as lost. But there doesn’t seem to be a trace of that in Louis’ expression, instead something reserved and a little hesitant, apologetic when his chest expands and he lowers himself down a few steps, hands tucked up under his armpits.

“I thought something had happened,” Harry says, a fragile admission.

“I guess you could say that,” Louis says, head ducked. “I hope Felicite wasn’t too harsh on you.”

“I can see the resemblance,” Harry says, and Louis looks up with a slow, twitching smile, “if that’s what you mean.”

“Right,” Louis laughs, a short, breathy thing. And Harry feels his own mouth pull up into a smile, heat settling in his chest. He almost presses his palm there to check that it’s real. “I, um. I probably should have told you that I took your advice.”

Harry’s brows raise, and he looks up towards the windows, pausing when he sees two blonde tufts of hair there, near identical faces staring back at him through the fogged glass. They disappear the moment Harry catches sight of them. He glances back to Louis. “Your sisters?”

“All inside,” Louis nods, quiet. “It feels–. I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.”

He’s never seen Louis stripped so bare, shoeless and without a jacket or coat, just a thick sweater, fuzzy socks, this softened vulnerability to the razor slopes of his face. Maybe it’s the morning light, a yellow-mellow trick, but the heat in Harry’s chest grows, almost burns for a moment, and he doesn’t know what it is, what it means, just that it makes his fingers curl up in his pockets, makes him feel heavy-headed.

“I don’t want to fuck it up,” Louis whispers. “I always fuck things up.”

Harry shakes his head. “You won’t.”

“You can’t know that.”

The sharpness is a sudden thing, Louis’ eyes downcast, and Harry doesn’t know what to say. Louis is right. He can’t know. But he feels a seed of hope bloom in his chest, so unfamiliar that is startles him, emerging from under dry, dead roots. They stand silently, that soft wind and the low song of the breaking swell. There’s so much that Harry doesn’t know, so many things in this world that he could never attempt to comprehend, so many things on this stretch of beach alone that he won’t ever absorb all the details of. 

It hurts to think of it, sometimes, those summer days with his face to the glass, learning the intricacies and quirks of people on pages to fill that dreadful silence. At the time he could trick himself into finding certain comforts in that, in losing himself to a world that didn’t exist. He lived in those places so long, in centuries he never existed in, countries he’d never seen; and that was fine when all he had were those little worlds, when that tiny room became his own storybook in itself.  But this isn’t a yellowed, familiar page in a story. This is the real world, and nobody is here to write out the details of it, and nothing around him will stay as it is forever.

Everything transcends, changes, shifts like a kaleidoscope. He has to read things as they are, not as he used to think them to be.

“Maybe you’re right. I don’t know them, or what happened between you. But I think I know you,” Harry says softly, when he comes back to himself, Louis’ words falling away. And it feels true, despite the distance that still remains between them, the clear weight behind this moment that’s come from a place Harry can’t see the other side of. “I know you’ll try.”

Louis’ shoulders curl in as he shrugs, and with a breath that guard comes up slow and steady, face settling back into something familiar, colder, mouth pinched.

“I won’t be out on the boat while they’re here.” Louis drags a pointed toe along the edge of a wooden step. “Just for a few days. So.”

“Okay,” Harry says, a rasp. “That’s okay.”

A pause between them. Harry’s fingers curl up in his pockets.

“I was just, um,” he takes a step back, inclines his head back up the beach, “just checking in on you, so. I should go.”

Something unreadable passes over Louis’ face. “Okay.”

Harry makes to leave but there’s a hesitance in his step, and when he casts his gaze towards the wharf it looks strangely distant and out of focus. It’s a sudden burst of unease, of achiness, hollow yet heavy in the joints of his knees, in his shoulders when he hunches them in and tucks his face down into his coat. The sea wind has started to pick up.

“Harry.”

He turns, and Louis is on the sand now, too, hand still resting on the banister, the split wood there dull and frayed. Harry can’t read his eyes; he can barely even think. It’s like a sudden rush of static has laced itself up his neck, loud and muffled in his ears, and with it, mumbled and murmured and embedded in all those frequencies, are all the thoughts he’s been pushing down, pushing back, hiding away as best he can. 

Louis doesn’t say anything, and Harry is almost glad for it, when he turns and starts the walk. The look is enough, the stretch of silence, the sand and the gathering of cloud behind them. The pink tone of the cliffside where the sun is trying to blush. 

-

Aimlessness is the quiet mind’s worst enemy. It’s not the loudest thoughts that speak the most volume, that appear like a slate over everything else. Those are a constant, a barrage, a numbing, guttural voice. It’s the silent, simpering voices that seep through the cracks, the little whispers that cause the most harm. A tired, listless day leaves room for phantom breaths to be heard, a space finally made for the things that are ignored, pushed to the side, stuffed under the pillow at night and suffocated.

Sitting by the edge of the pier today, the grey-scale slate of the sky cracked and lined through with weedy, overgrown clouds, Harry tries to fight those thoughts away without giving them the attention they’re seeking. _Arlo_ bumps softly against the wood, almost coaxing, but Harry remains with his legs dangling, hands tucked between his thighs against the morning chill. The wharf is a low scuffle of movement, _Mary-Rose_ and company being loaded for the day, the squeak of rubber and the thud of rope and the low gurgle of ancient engines floating out across the wharf. 

He remains, watches the slow float of them until they’re hazy silhouettes in the distance. His eyes are still crusted in the corners from sleep, and he rubs his thumb there for a moment, then lets his head droop forward, lids shut. There’s an itch under his skin, a certain need to move. _Something’s missing,_ his mind whispers, a gentle nudge in his bones when he feels _Arlo_ hit the side of the pier again. He tried to remain beneath the covers this morning, to bury his face under the cold sheets; but then the first light caught the shiny edges of the window chips, his coat haphazard over the chair across from the bed. There was that reflexive moment, seeing himself staring down at his feeble, pale body in the bed, and that had been enough to have his bones creaking awake, cold soles on the cold floor.

Now, feet wrapped tight in weathered boots, he feels that similar twitching burn of reflexivity, like if he turned to look over his shoulder he’d see himself hunched under the shelter, book in hand, watching back with a brow raised, a silent question. It’s enough to unsettle him into standing. 

He walks as the sun comes up. 

The beach is quiet, soft overturned sand spritzed in wispy clouds low along the stretch, a gentle hiss where it draws up along the stoops of homes, where the water crawls up and laps its foamy tongue towards broken shells. When he reaches the edge of the cliffs a trail of orange glow falls behind him, and then he tucks himself back behind the frontline until the soft give of sand underfoot becomes the firm press of pavement, the rise and fall of the little town overshadowing him and shielding the view of the sea. 

Like the frontline blends with the beach, little homes become one with the edges of the mountains and hills, the cluster of trees dark green and overhanging. It’s here that nature reclaims itself, and Harry can see it now, as he starts to ascend an old trail onto the hillside. Cape Breton’s horseshoe and the gulf of the sea, the dead space that runs a divisive line through the centre, and then here, the place where humanity starts to fade away again, where he’s sure that if he reached the tops of the hills and peered over the other side, he’d be met with nothing but a sprawl of green and grey, the ocean surrounding them on all sides. 

He uses the lonely mornings to walk once he’s done his time down by the wharf, watching and waiting and listening to the waves gurgle. To explore, to distract himself from the aching pull in his bones, from the ever-present whisper along the shell of his ear each morning that he wakes, the newness of the greenery and the damp ground becomes something to focus on. The homes here are weatherbeaten much like the frontline, though the wood holds a certain dew, the roofs and walls streaked from dripping branches and the mildews of winter. 

There’s a small cemetery tucked right before the first trail, a thin iron fence, long grass and bushes and overgrown trees cascading like a fence all on its own, and then further up the trail are rotting benches, the wood stripped of its first layer and spotted with moss. There are gaps in the treeline here and there, places where a flatness finds a home, and he can see the whole of Cape Breton, the trawlers floating out on distant water in the path of the rising sun. 

So high up it almost feels like he could reach out for a cloud and feels the wetness in his hands.

But there’s no such twisted comfort as the rocking wood of the pier, and in the noons, night so quick to try and fall, Harry finds himself under _Arlo_ ’s little shelter, one of the bloated, yellowed books cradled in his hands. He realizes it, then, as he sits and watches the water, distracted by the ebb of it, that the nauseating, curling feeling in his stomach he’s come to know so well, has dissipated. In its wake, a rocking calm like that of a crib, like the back and forth lull of a swing slowly coming to a stop.

-

The rain falls light and cautious this morning. It’s still so early, and out on the water the bruised blue of approaching clouds looks like the underside of a curling wave, swooping upwards in a thick mass, a haze below it where the heavier rain follows. For now, the mist is gentle, the kind that sticks on lashes, and Harry waits under _Arlo_ ’s shelter today with his face tucked into the side of his damp coat. The quiet is broken up by the weight of boots on the wharf, the morning gravel of tired, smoked out voices. 

It’s easy to wash it out at first, to trace his fingers along pages and watch the water and the oncoming stretch of cloud. But then he hears the hollow thud of close footsteps, boots on the little pier. It makes him pause, heart suddenly fluttering against his ribs, and he looks upward, expecting the flash of red, a trail of familiar smoke, a hope that whatever happened between Louis and his sisters has settled and resolved.

Instead, Sheriff Wellard's ruddy face comes into view, beady eyes peering down into the boat and skimming over Harry like he isn’t even there.

“Where’s Tomlinson?” he says, hands on his hips. 

Harry’s stomach swoops, fingers tightening around the pages. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t?” Wellard says, unimpressed.

“No,” Harry says. 

“Is he making you lie to me, b’y?” Wellard hums.

“What?” Harry huffs. Rain is starting to blow in harder now, thicker droplets that make things seem fuzzy. 

“Ol’ _Alro_ here hasn’t left her slip in days,” Wellard says, a hand up on the frame of the shelter now so he can lean in closer, and Harry retracts, throat thick. “To me that seems mighty suspicious.” 

No part of that makes sense, and Harry shakes his head, suddenly fuelled by this defensive spike in his chest, hot under the collar at Wellard’s careless, sweeping gaze. “He’s spending time with his family. I don’t see how that’s got anything to do with you.”

Wellard levels Harry with a look, and all bravery drains out of Harry’s heart, instead leaving a cold chill down the spine.

“Tomlinson doesn’t have any family left, kid,” he says. “You ought to think twice about telling me lies.”

“He hasn’t done anything,” Harry says softly. “He–”

“You been around here long?” Wellard says.

Harry swallows. “No.”

“Then don’t tell me what I do and don’t know about my own town,” Wellard says, pointing a sharp finger to emphasis the words. “I don’t know how Tomlinson’s wound you into this little shitbox, but everything that happens on this wharf concerns me. Everything that happens in this place is my business. Includin’ you. We clear on that?”

Harry stares up at him. “Yes.”

“Good,” Wellard says, pushing himself away. _Arlo_ rocks firmly into the pier. “I’m watching you, the both of ya’s.”

Harry remains still as he listens to the retreat of heavy footsteps, book held to his chest. The cloud is close, bringing with it a tinge of navy blue, and _Arlo_ ’s deck is sleek and slippery with rainwater, Harry’s clothes dotted with droplets. The sea is starting to churn, the siren songs beginning, and he’s frozen in place. There’s the stutter of engines, the broad figures of the trawlers starting their rocky drift out along the white caps. 

Harry waits, then he walks, and back at the old house by the cliffs he sits on the stoop and puts his head in his hands and lets his knees shake back and forth, up and down, palms to his forehead, fingers gripped in his hair. He feels slightly out of body, strange, panicked, and as it grows dark he crosses the beach again, hands deep in his pockets, face tucked against the rainfall.

The sky is clustered and cracked with shadow, the last of the light playing atop the water, and things seem topsy-turvy, the stretch of sand before him, the water, the clouds, all shadowed in black and blue, but the slip of sky between all these things is light, cradles the same burnt oranges and ambers that dot the frontline, like the dying sun is hiding itself in these homes, preserving itself on land until it rises up again. 

Every home but one. 

It’s unlit, hollow, and the slant of the cliffs in this light makes it seem as though the hillside is about to collapse and splinter the wood. Harry is cautious as he climbs the stoop, hesitant when he knocks. The curtains over the cobwebbed windows are closed, and there isn’t a breath of movement from within. Harry stands facing the wood. The seawind caresses the back of his neck and ruffles his hair, thin little whistles that taunt him. 

He knocks again. There’s no response. 

He wonders whether he should wait, if he should sit on the steps and watch the push and pull of the water until his limbs freeze, until the sun comes up again. It’s with heavy feet that he turns and descends back onto the beach, blinking against the wetness of his lashes, the onslaught of rain that’s no longer gentle. Shoulders curled in, he heads up the beach again, this time slipping by the front-line. 

The bar is quiet when he pushes inside. There are two men talking softly in the corner, music down low, barely a breath. Behind the bar, Fergus glances up from where he’s polishing a glass. The apprehensive pause that shutters over his features has Harry’s stomach curling. The weight of the air is heavy, hot, all the warm coloured lights blurring into one, and it’s as Fergus turns away from him with a shake of his head that Harry looks down the line of booths, swallowing when he sees the crown of Louis’ head across the room, tucked into their regular spot. 

Cautiously, he approaches.

Louis’ body is slumped over, both elbows braced on the table, and there’s a stack of sticky glasses beside him, one tipped onto its side and dribbling left over alcohol onto the already shiny top. He’s still, breaths heavy, and Harry stares down at him with no idea of what to say, to do, of how Louis ended up here.

“Hey,” he says softly as he sits, their knees brushing. 

Louis looks up. His eyes are bloodshot, hollow, this look of pure desolation as he stares back at Harry, unblinking. It’s frightening to see, and Harry almost curls himself away, a thick, sickly sludge spinning knots in his stomach as he tries to see past the sheen over Louis’ gaze. There’s sweat gathered along his neck and cheeks, hair greasy and mused from where he’s been leaning against his hands. 

Slow, disorientated, Louis knocks the rest of his drink back and taps his fingers clumsily against the glass, then lets it hit the table as he meets Harry’s eye again.

“There you are,” he says, but it’s bitter, slurred, and Harry shift uncomfortably at the tone in his voice, this rough, tired strain.

Harry doesn’t know how to ask if he’s alright, if he should, because something is so obviously not alright. Things feel breakable, like they’re coming apart at the seams. He doesn’t want to let it fall apart.

“How w–”

Louis shifts abruptly, slapping his hands against the table as he swivels his body towards the bar. “Fergus! ‘Nother drink. I’m all out.”

“Think you’ve had enough for tonight,” Fergus says casually from over the bar. He’s unbothered, flicking his cloth up onto his shoulder and lifting a clean tray of glasses into a rack. “You oughta head out.”

“I asked for a drink,” Louis says, sharp, but his worlds are jumbling and Harry sits back with a hand over his curling stomach. “That’s you’re fuckin’ job, in’t?”

“I’m cutting you off,” Fergus says.

“Fuck off you are,” Louis says, and their knees clack together as he stumbles to his feet. “I want–. I want another drink. I asked for a drink and now you’ve gotta give me another one.”

“You’re cut off,” Fergus repeats, voice calm and unwavered, and that only seems to fuel Louis on, this strained, destructive rhythm to his footsteps as he approaches the bar now, catching himself of the edge of it and leaning towards Fergus with a pointed finger.

“This is bullshit,” he spits. “Fuckin’ bullshit.”

“You’ve had enough, lad,” Fergus says, firmer this time. “Look at yourself.”

“You’re a cunt,” Louis bursts, set off now as he snarls, and Harry stands before he knows what he’s doing. “Don’t fuckin’ tell me to–. To _look_ at myself, to look at how fucked–”

“Get out,” Fergus says, pointing to the door. “Get the fuck out of my bar, Louis.”

“No,” Louis says. “No, fuck you. Fuck you, Fergus.”

“That’s it.” Fergus throws his cloth down and rounds the bar, face red, and he grabs Louis roughly by the arm, pulling him with such force that Louis loses his footing immediately, face twisting up into a snarl, too drunk to keep his balance. Harry rushes to follow, ignoring the pressing heat of the two men by the bar, trying to think past the panic and the hurt of this, the sickly feeling that crawls up his throat when he slips outside to see Fergus throw Louis out onto the street. He lands with a painful thud on his side.

“Great, thanks!” Louis shouts, voice cracking as Fergus shakes his head and turns away, shoving past Harry as he does so. “Fuckin’ top work, Fergus, just great. You’re a real gem, aren’t you?”

“Go home, you dickhead,” Fergus calls over his shoulder. Then he’s slipping back into the bar, and it’s just Harry and Louis left on the poorly lit street, rain coming down on them in silver drops. He can see the sweat shining Louis’ face, the wetness of his eyes as he shakily rolls up onto his knees.

“Hey,” Harry breathes, crouching beside him with a hand over his back when Louis doesn’t move any further than that. “Louis, look at me.”

“Don’t,” Louis says, muffled against his arm as he shakes Harry off. “Don’t bother.”

“Up you get,” Harry says, softer now as he gently grabs Louis’ arms, helping him sit straight. “C’mon, it’s late.”

Louis manages to get to his feet eventually, but his limbs are heavy and lax, and he leans on Harry for support, feet dragging and catching and making them stumble. He keeps muttering to himself, cursing up a storm.

“I don’t even know why you _bother_ ,” he slurs when they touch the beach, waves crashing in and making the sludge of his words harder to understand. “Why anyone fucking _bothers_ with this, it’s bullshit, it’s such bullshit–”

This dissolves into another slur of swearing, and he kicks up a mound of sound, then almost loses his footing. Harry struggles to hold him up as they trudge through the wet grains, even more so when Louis tries to pull them towards the water, making a breaking run for the waves. By the time they reach the house Louis is finally subdued, but his quietness feels worse than the slurring and the stumbling, the way he goes docile and still as he hands Harry the key. 

The hallway opens up like an endless chasm in the dark. Harry leads Louis through it with a firm hold. It’s cold and damp inside the bedroom, the lingering smell of stale smoke clinging to the corners, and he sets Louis on the edge of the bed while he fumbles for the lamp switch. Everything is blue and silver, Louis’ lashes white-tipped, and that hollow, simmering look has crowded his expression again, everything about his body limp like a ragdoll, like Harry could touch a single finger to his chest and he’d collapse down into the sheets.   

The lamp flickers to life, a new, hazy yellow blushing outwards. In this light, Louis’ face becomes gaunt, and Harry can see the grime in a new way, the cling of it around Louis’ bitten lips, the swollen redness of his waterlines, the gloss it paints across his scar. They stare at each other for a moment, and there’s not a sound in the room, nothing but their breathing. 

Slow, methodical, Harry leans down to his knees and starts to untie Louis’ boots. They’re knotted awkwardly. He has to pick at the loops, jaw clenched lightly. Each second seems to tick on, and when he glances up Louis is blinking down at him softly, drunkenly, thumbs brushing against one another subconsciously in his lap. Finally, Harry slips off the boots and tucks them under the bed.

“Wait here, okay?” he whispers, barely a sound. Louis doesn’t nod, just blinks at him again and watches, and Harry leaves the room with heat cradling his jaw. He grabs one of the towels from the brittle bathroom, then feels his way through the dark towards the kitchen. 

He flicks on the light. Pauses.

There are dishes piled in the sink, things misplaced, and at the table four of the chairs are pushed back and disturbed, one a few metres away like it’s been shoved. Swallowing, he leaves everything untouched and reaches up into one of the cupboards for a glass. 

Louis hasn’t moved when Harry slips back into the bedroom. He’s staring numbly down at his fiddling hands, and Harry realizes then that he’s picking at the loose skin by his thumbs, leaving the skin there blushing pink. 

“Here,” Harry says. He touches the inside of Louis’ wrist lightly to get his hands to part. The skin there is soft, warm despite the cold around them, and Louis stares as he accepts the water, hazy-eyed. 

Hesitantly, Harry brings the towel to Louis’ forehead and brushes the sweat and the sand away, then down his temples, the underside of his jaw, following all the lines of his face carefully. When he brushes the towel over Louis’ scarred cheek, their eyes meet. Harry can’t look away, feels this indescribable, burning heat pooling at his cheeks, and Louis’ eyes look wet, glazed as he pulls his face back and looks down at his lap. 

Harry pauses, towel still raised, and then he, too, pulls away, reaching behind Louis to wordlessly draw back the sheets. Louis is lax, out of it when he puts the glass on the table and shifts, burrowing himself into his pillow as he stares up at Harry blankly, swallows when Harry pulls the sheets back up over him. Harry doesn’t look as he tucks them into the mattress, keeps his eyes down as he crosses the room to shut the still open blinds, silver pouring in to try and cut through the gold lamplight. 

“You’re good at that.”

Harry pauses, fingers still looped in the fine little string. When he glances over, Louis has shifted slightly onto his back, watching with hooded eyes.

“At what?” Harry says.

“Taking care of other people,” Louis says.

Harry holds his breath, and he doesn’t say anything in return, can’t. Instead, he pulls the blinds firmly closed and stares at the dusty pane, the way the lamp casts shadows, the dewy honey they’re stuck in, 

“‘S funny,” Louis says, a breathless, broken chuckle. “When we do that, y’know, care so much about someone else that we stop giving a shit about ourselves.”

It’s slurred, muffled into the sheets, his eyes tired and bloodshot, and then they slip closed and Harry is left standing there with his heart in his mouth, this hollow emptiness appearing like a chasm in the pit of his stomach. Louis’ breathing fills the room and Harry can’t believe how empty he feels in this moment, how harshly his stomach lurches when he rounds the bed to flick off the lamp and slips out into the hall, closing the door behind him. 

He feels out of body when he steps into the living room, when he lights the fire, when he sits at the couch and notices the books strewn on the coffee table, _Black Beauty_ among them, face-down and parted, and it seems as though all it takes is a blink and he’s back in New York, a cold winter night with his blue-veined knees tucked up to his chest while his mother slowly died just down the hallway. 

The amount of times he tied her laces when she couldn’t anymore, the towels he watched spin in the rusted washer until his stomach churned along with it, all these echoed impressions making themselves known, surging up over him, and he sits himself down in front of the fire and holds his palms to the heat, trying to escape the memory, to pull himself away from that place, but it’s quiet again, nothing but his thoughts and the dull crackle of flame. 

-

Harry comes to with a crick in his neck so prominent that it hurts the moment he blinks awake. It runs a searing pain down his spine and to the tips of his toes, then flows back up in a tingling sensation to his knees, this awful pull that makes every shift of his body feels like his limbs are being stretched. Blinking awake slowly, he registers the darkness of the room first, the fire reduced to a dull simper, glowing soft red, and there’s a crack in the curtain, a piercing slither of foggy light brushing against his eye and attempting to part his lashes. 

It’s still early. Everything is blushed blue, shadows and dust huddled like little spirits in the corners. With a soft groan, he manages to sit up a little straighter, and for a disorientating moment he doesn’t know where he is. Palms spread, he feels the fabric of cushions under his hands, a loose spring digging into his thigh. He’s fallen asleep on Louis’ sofa. His skin prickles at the realization, further when he can’t even conjure up the memory that told him to leave.

Breathing in heavily, he gently works his neck side to side, toes flexing as the pain subsides, and he rubs a fist against his dry, tired eyes. Things start to clear, head losing it’s heavy-sleep fog, and it’s then that he sees the yellow glow, barely there light brushing at the edges of the hall. The gurgle of running water. The muffled, spine-prickling sound of retching.

There’s a pause, a few gasped breaths, and then the retching continues, strangled and raw. Harry rises on shaky legs, still half-asleep as he peers gingerly around the corner. The bathroom door is wide open, cold light spilling into the hall, and he presses a calming hand over his own stomach when there’s a wet, dreadful cough from inside.

Louis has his back to him, when Harry cautiously looks in. He’s lost his sweater during the night, and sweat clings to the back of his neck, hair looking damp, arms shiny with it. His body is bowed over the toilet, forearm rested along the back, head pressed up against it to support himself, and he’s shuddering, shoulder blades shifting beneath his shirt as he retches again, spine rolling with it. Barefoot on the cold tile, Harry can’t tell if Louis is shaking from the chill, the nausea, or both.

“Louis,” he says softly, and Louis freezes, head bowed.

Slow, he turns minutely to look at Harry over his shoulder, face nestled in the bent crook of his arm. All Harry can see is his scar and the bloodshot slit of his eye, greasy hair a mess across his forehead and nose, skin flushed and beaded with sweat. He closes his eyes and looks away.

“What are you doing here?” he says, a dreadful rasp that makes Harry’s own throat twitch.

“I fell asleep on the couch,” Harry admits, scratching at his neck as it prickles. “I helped you home last night.

“Jesus,” Louis breathes. He sits up slowly to rest his forehead against his palm, still leant over the toilet bowl. A tense silence settles between then, and Harry can hear the thickness of Louis’ breathing, the choking way he swallows. “I don’t remember.”

“You, um. You got into a fight with Fergus,” Harry says. Louis shakes his head and sits back on his haunches, rubbing both hands over his face roughly. “He threw you out.”

“I’m sorry,” Louis croaks. “You shouldn't've had to deal with that.” 

“It’s okay–”

“It isn’t,” Louis says sharply, and Harry’s mouth clicks shut. He watches the tense rise and fall of Louis’ shoulders, the way they loosen as he sighs. “Please don’t say it’s okay.”

Stiffly, Louis rises on shaky legs. Harry watches as he washes out his mouth, splashes water over his cheeks. He avoids his own eye in the mirror, instead looking at the lines of Louis’ back, the skin of his arms, a piece of him he’s never seen before. Things feel sterile, cold, the tiles giving off this desolate chill, but then Louis glances up and meets Harry’s gaze in the mirror, and caught, neck already dusted red, Harry cuts his eyes away and steps back out into the hall. 

They don’t speak as Louis shuffles into the dimly lit kitchen, fumbling to push apart the blinds. He’s almost a different person like this, and Harry can see how thin he is now without the layers, the nubs of his wrists and elbows, the shift of his shoulders beneath his shirt. Dawn is foggy and blooms a still blue, and then the tap is turned and the rush of water fills up the space between them, Louis silent and stoic as he starts to work through the pile of dishes in the sink. 

“What happened?” Harry asks, a palm over one of the displaced chairs.

Louis shrugs and slots a plate into the old drying rack. “Same thing that happened last time they tried to visit me. We love each other for an hour and then it’s all out war the second I grab my coat.” 

“But they must have missed you,” Harry says softly, stomach sinking. “After so long–”

“How could they?” Louis says. “How could they miss this.”

It’s so quietly spoken, almost lost under the wash of water and the clinking of porcelain, and Louis is just a silhouette, almost see-through when he shifts and the light pours around him. Harry doesn’t know what to say, or how to fix this, and it isn’t even his place to try. But last night, the hollowness he saw, the hurt, the destruction, it makes his stomach curl. 

“It’s–”

“Just _drop_ it, Harry,” Louis says, quick as a whip when he spits the words over his shoulder, and Harry balks at the sheen of wetness in his eyes, the shuddering breath he takes in as he dumps the plate back into the sink roughly, arms braced on the counter. 

Harry presses his teeth together, takes in a breath at the wave of shakiness that rattles his ribs. Then he storms into the hall, reaches for the red coat hung by the door, and when he marches back into the kitchen Louis is watching him curiously.

“Let’s go,” Harry says. He tosses the jacket over the table, and Louis fumbles as he catches it.

“What?”

“I need to get my coat,” Harry says. “And then we’re going.”

Louis blinks at him wildly. They stare at each other for a moment, Louis slightly bewildered, Harry with his hands on his hips to steady himself, and then Louis folds and slips his arms into his coat, the red bright in the dimly lit kitchen.

They don’t speak a word as they trudge along the beach. The frontline is still sleeping soundly, waves silver-lit and toned black, and the sky seems hollow, bone-white in the corners, clouds hovering over distant white caps. Louis has his face tucked into his coat, shoulders hunched. There’s a terse electricity between them as they kick up sand. Harry doesn’t know how to read it, isn’t sure he even wants to try and dissect his own thoughts right now. He just needs the routine, the distraction, and maybe that’s what Louis needs, too. 

It occurs to Harry as he unlocks the shoddy, stuck door, that he has no idea whether Louis has seen the inside of this place or not. He can already hear the shrill whistle inside, that gap-tooth sound, and as he uses his weight to shove the door open, he makes a beeline for the staircase, hoping to make this as quick as possible. 

It’s still shocks him, how cold it gets inside, and that’s the first comment Louis makes when he steps over the threshold, wide eyes looking up and around him.

“It’s fucking freezing in here,” he says, voice shot. He turns to Harry. “Why is it so cold in here?”

“I think there are holes in floor somewhere,” Harry says awkwardly, one foot on the staircase. “I can hear the wind whistling at night.”

Louis turns in a slow circle, arms crossed over his chest. “And how are you paying for this place?”

“I, um,” Harry trails off. He looks at his feet. “I inherited some money.”

Louis pokes his head into the kitchen. “It’s falling to pieces.”

“I don’t mind–”

“Look at the rust in here!” Louis says, voice drifting as he disappears into the room, and Harry closes his eyes as he hears Louis shuffling things about, opening the fridge and testing the burners. He emerges back out into the hallway. “I didn’t realize it was this bad.”

“It’s fine.”

Louis slips past Harry, trudging his way upstairs, and Harry follows with his heart in his throat. His coat is draped over one of the spare chairs, sheets unmade and drawers a mess, but Louis is looking at the window without the curtain, tapping the toe of his boot against the nails that stick up from the floor. Dust floats around him, and Louis turns to look at Harry slowly, eyes soft.

“You don’t have to stay here.”

“I don’t have anywhere else,” Harry says.

“That’s not true,” Louis says, hesitant when he scratches at his beard and looks out the window. “You could–. You could stay with me, if you wanted. Just until spring wakes up.”

“It’s fine, really,” Harry insists, cheeks hot. “I’ll manage on my own.”

“But you don’t have to,” Louis says. 

There’s something about the way he says it, quiet and open, that makes Harry look away. _I don’t know any other way._ He runs a hand through his hair.

“I said it’s fine,” Harry says, and it’s strange to be sharp, gets caught in his chest and ends up as a fumble of words when he reaches for his coat, slipping it on and heading back downstairs in the hope Louis will follow without question. 

The wharf is quiet, only just beginning to buzz with activity. Harry keeps his head down when they pass the _Mary-Rose_ , ignoring the low, trilled whistle he hears from the cabin. He refuses to look back, and Louis moves him along with a gentle hand on the back of his arm, the two of them with their shoulders tucked as they head towards an aimless and sea-washed _Arlo_. 

Harry doesn’t know when it started to feel good, to have rope under his hands, that roughness, but there’s something right about tying the knots, the press of his palms against the pier. Something real. Raw. _Arlo_ hums, almost a purr as they head out to the open water, and it’s dark around them, first slips of pale sun wafting up like thin smoke. The wind is gentle, for now, but the cold is fierce as ever, and Harry waits with his hands tucked under his armpits for Louis to move, for them to start setting the nets.

Louis remains still at the stern, facing the sea. 

“What is it?” Harry says. 

The breeze blows at their hair, and Harry comes to stand by the stern, too, glancing at Louis’ face. He scratches at his beard and looks down into the water.

“Thank you,” he says. “For last night.”

“I said it was okay–”

“Harry,” Louis says tiredly, eyes closing. “Just–. Just let me thank you. I know it might not mean anything to you, but anyone else would have just left me there. So, thank you.”

“It did,” Harry says. Louis looks at him, and Harry continues, after a beat, “mean something to me.” 

The words escape thin and breathless, clawing their way out, and the way Louis regards him is quiet, careful, unsure as he breaks their gaze again. The water laps around them wetly, a soft hush where it hits the boat and sprays, and they’re two coloured specks here, side by side in their red and yellow coats with the sky opening up in front of them.

“It was my fault,” Louis says softly, “that they left, I mean.”

Harry says nothing, instead waiting for Louis to continue on his own. He doesn’t want to push, to pry, not when they’re both still fragile from shedding another layer, queasy and quiet and flushed pink.

“We were talking, y’know, about the house, the finances. That always ends in flames. Daisy made this comment,” Louis says, followed by a soft laugh, and he runs his fingers up through his beard. “She said I looked like dad, sounded like him, they way we were speaking to each other then. Said that with my beard I was a spitting image of him.”

Louis’ face sours, and he shakes his head, lowers his eyes. “I think that was the worst of it, being compared to him. To have them see me as he was when I always tried so hard not to be that person, when the whole reason this all–”

He cuts himself off sharply. A wave crushes gently against _Arlo_ ’s side, and Harry blinks against the spray, hands wrung together in front of him. 

“Shave it off, then,” he says softly, and he has to contemplate saying it, at first. Because it sounds easy, a simple thing, but Harry knows it isn’t, knows that it could never be when Louis uses it as armour, when a connection runs deeper that looking into the mirror.

“I’ve had it for so long,” Louis says softly. “I can’t even remember what I look like with a smooth face. And then there’s this…it looks worse without the distraction.”

He touches the edge of his scar.

“Without hiding it, you mean,” Harry says. Louis glances up at him, this surprised flicker there, a hint of amusement when his mouth quirks.

“You know, I think I liked you better when you didn’t talk,” he says, and it catches Harry off guard when he starts to laugh, bright from his chest, and Louis joins him, shaking his head as he looks back out to the water. “No need to be so sharp, alright?”

“Maybe I’ll say that when you shave your beard off,” Harry says. Louis bites down on a smile. “Think I liked you better with facial hair.”

“Alright, _settle,_ ” Louis says, laughing again, and when he looks up at Harry there’s a shine in his eyes, glossing over the hurt that settled there before. And this, to make light of something that was sitting so heavy, this temporary relief from the hurt, it blooms something new in Harry’s chest. A warmth that isn’t weighted, that feels featherlight, that doesn’t go running for the hills when the moment passes.

They part ways when they bring _Arlo_ in, but by nightfall they’re together again, Harry knocking tentatively on Louis’ door. Elvis croons low and they eat at the now neatened table, and there are still the traces, a stray mug, the displacement of dust by the hooks, a door left cracked in the hall. They cradle tea by the fire, and Harry sorts through the books already there, brushes _Black Beauty_ but lets it rest, reaching instead for the worn softness of something unknown, the dark cover for _City of Night_ that’s collecting dust on the mantle.

And soon the dark takes over the lounge, the fire simmering away, and Harry doesn’t mean to fall asleep, and he doesn’t know when it happens, but when he blinks awake again he’s warm, rumpled, curled up on the sofa with an old blanket thrown across his body. The fire is still lit, red and amber spilling over the floor where _City of Night_ rests in the place he must have dropped it, and as Harry slowly comes to he can see Louis’ figure across the hall in the kitchen, humming quietly to himself as he cooks.

-

He soon becomes accustomed to waking in the bask of warm light, a fleshy, orange-pink colour that spills across the rug in the mornings, nearly translucent. The couch is a small thing, barely holds the full length of his body, and some days his feet are hanging out from under the blanket, others his knees are tucked up close to his chest, rough fabric pressed to his chin. He tells time in the state of the fire; the dull simper means he’s the first to wake, soot all red cracked and the ebb of it low, and then there are times he blinks his eyes open and there’s a thin sheen of sweat above his lip, the flames dancing, curtain gently parted to let the first slips of the morning start to seep inside.

He tells himself this isn’t habit or something conscious. The warmth just lulls him at night, and he’s so used to always being cold, to blinking at the bare window and feeling the brittle, silvery nettles of moonlight sink in its teeth. With the dusty curtains shut and the room blushed maroon, the aroma of tea and burning wood curled up close, he drifts off most nights with a book in his hands, Louis breathing evenly beside him.

He flushes, when he thinks about it. Falling asleep sitting up, waking with a blanket tucked around his body and no recollection of pulling the old thing from the back of the couch in the night. But Louis never says anything when Harry shuffles into the kitchen each morning, when they sit quietly over breakfast and drink their tea and grab their coats, and Harry always pauses when he sees them hanging there in the hall, red and yellow, side by side and taking up a little more space amongst the hooks.

They still part ways in the afternoons. 

The house feels more barren each time Harry shoves his way through the door, and things are stitled, untouched, dust collecting around bits and pieces exactly as he left them, a book on the table, a pot on a stove, a sweater shoved in a drawer that he hasn’t taken out since he put it there in the first place. It’s all grey and blue, pale, and it makes his skin itch to sit at the dining table, to fold his thumb against the frayed edge of pages. 

Somehow, someway, it feels more comforting to sit out on the rotten stoop, to be closer to the cliffs and to see the beach, to glance up along the stretch when movement on the wharf pulls his focus from the words. 

_Abandoned by the soft affectionate creature that had for so long inhabited it, that derelict life had merely stopped, it floated, filled with unechoed cries and ineffectual hopes, with sombre splendours, antiquated faces and perfumes, it floated at the outer edge of the world, between parentheses, unforgettable and self subsistent, more indestructible that a mineral, and nothing could prevent it from having been, it had just undergone it’s final metamorphosis: its future was determined._

A flick of his eyes to the waves, searching for a silhouette in the distance. 

_‘A life’, thought Mathieu, ‘is formed from the future just as bodies are compounded from the void.’_

Along the beach, children dig their feet into the sand. Smoke puffs from mouths like rising from chimneys. Harry watches it all and wonders, thumb on the page that he can’t seem to concentrate on. There’s a burst of muffled laughter that floats towards him on the wind.

_He bent his head: he thought of his own life. The future had made way into his heart, where everything was in process and suspense. The far off days of childhood, the day when he said: ‘I will be free.’_

In the distance, he finally spots the hazy shape of _Arlo_ floating back towards the wharf, the afternoon sun blurred and bulbed behind the cloud cover. It’s getting late, breeze a thin chill, and Harry lets the book in his lap fall closed as he watches the little boat float inshore, cold chin in cold palm. There’s sand dusted on his skin but his head is far away, up in those muddy clouds, and it takes him a moment to realize the distraction isn’t the wharf, the stretch of beach, but the musings of his own head, the whisper of a name, the forming of an invisible little string that ties one end of the horseshoe to the other.

-

Spring is fighting its way past the heavy glum of Cape Breton’s cold snaps. As far as pleasantries go, being out on the water today is calmer than Harry has seen it, _Arlo_ rocking up and over the shift of the sea calmly, and the clouds in the distance are still lingering far away, leaving rare beams of rising sun free to slip down and touch the whitecaps. Breeze a gentle flutter, the air around them subdued, Harry tucks himself into the cabin in search of something new, Louis at the stern just watching the water, the nets sunk, and there seems, for the first time, to be no hurry, no sharpness, to pull them up again.

The air in the cabin hangs musty, the thin windows blocked out by the sheer amount of nondescript things piled up in the thin shelves, and Harry grabs for the first book he sees, a nameless black spine shoved among two others to his very right, frayed at the bottom. It’s a flimsy thing. He flicks his thumb through it as he sits, back to front as the pages flutter. Oddly, half are empty, and as he repeats the motion, paper flickerings, he notices the pen marks in the margins, the uneven slant of the lines on pages that’ve been filled, water smudged.

He stops the movement of the pages with a gentle thumb, peering at the words there curiously. No page numbers, a mismatch of coloured pen, and it’s then that he realizes with a bated breath that the contents have been written, not typed, and that the book holds empty pages because they’re yet to be filled. He glances up. Louis is still facing the water with his hands braced against the back of the stern. Quietly, Harry flicks through the pages, a strange weight in his chest at what he finds there.

Some of it is prose, other parts poetry, a stream of consciousness that becomes interrupted by harsh scribbles, dashes across the pages, entire paragraphs blacked out. Harry thumbs over the bottom of the page, the words tucked there in black pen, and he thinks of the dusty, sterile typewriter in the bedroom, the ripped out pages pinned to the walls, the bookshelf and the boxes on the top shelf of the cupboard, Louis disappearing without a trace in the afternoons.

_The two-way mirror is smudged with prints and I no longer know who put them there. A shadow walks a slow circle around the room._

_To be watched, or to be watching, trapped within or trapped on the outside with a palm to the glass. There’s no way to tell which room is which. That is the real mystery of reconciliation in misfortune._

“Is that–”

Harry flinches as he looks up and meets Louis’ eye. He’s looking back over his shoulder, but it’s only a moment later that he crosses the deck and snatches the book from Harry’s hands, pressing it close to his chest. 

“What are you doing?” he hisses, and Harry balks.

“I didn’t realize–”

Louis storms past him and shoves the book back into the cabin. It’s electric, and suddenly the calm day doesn’t seem so calming anymore, a sickly feeling twirling in Harry’s stomach when they rise up with the swell, when Louis lets out a long breath and pulls himself back out of the cabin, regarding Harry cautiously. 

“Was that yours?” Harry asks. Louis cuts his eyes away. 

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he mutters, brushing past Harry to stand by the stern again, arms crossed over his chest.

“But–”

“I said _enough_ , okay?” Louis says, voice lost in the wind, but the sharpness remains. Harry stares at the tense line of his shoulders, heart beating against his chest, sure that even with the wind and the flush of the water, Louis will be able to hear it knock.

“It was good,” Harry says softly.

“Well, great.” Louis huffs a bitter laugh. “Thank you for your professional opinion.”  

Harry feels his mouth flatten, but he says nothing more, instead staring out to the water. The vague flash of anger he felt slowly morphs into a heavy guilt, and he flushes gradually, embarrassed, frustrated at the way they’re both simmering, the way Louis is clearly uncomfortable. It hurts to hear that razor edge in Louis’ voice directed his way again, but then Harry hears a sigh, and when he risks a glance in Louis’ direction, he’s hung his head, and turns to face Harry with his back leant against _Arlo_ ’s side, arms still crossed over his chest.

“Sorry,” he says, staring at his feet. “I didn’t mean to explode like that.”

Harry blinks at him. “I understand.”

“Why do you let me off so easily?” Louis says, looking to Harry now.  

“I know you didn’t mean it,” Harry says. 

“What if I did?” 

“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being defensive if you can acknowledge it,” Harry says, and Louis’ cheeks darken as he averts his eyes. “And I don’t have any right to just pry into things that belong to you.”

“That wasn’t–” Louis cuts himself off, jaw working. 

They’re silent, and the wind is picking up, the dregs of winter waking from its slumber and pushing spring out of its way.  

“You don’t have to explain anything to me,” Harry says, picking at a loose thread on his pants. “I’m sorry I looked through it.”

Louis sighs again, then pushes away from the edge of the boat and takes the seat beside Harry, legs stretched out in front of him with his arms crossed over his chest. He’s watching the water but Harry is stuck on the lines of his face, his nose, the tones of his beard, the paleness of his eyes compared to the water. It’s only when Louis glances at him that Harry looks down into his lap, picking at the loose skin by his thumb. 

“Did you read much when you were a kid?” Louis asks, after the silence has stretched on, the sun coming up properly now. Harry wonders if the other trawlers are already back in their slips, if the _Mary-Rose_ is looming over the wharf and awaiting their return.

“All the time,” Harry says, searching for the memories with hesitance, the candlelight, the long grass in the fields. 

Louis huffs a soft laugh, and when Harry looks at him again there’s a distant, wan look on his face, smile barely there. “My dad used to throw my books off the wharf if he caught me reading them. Just like that, y’know. Like they were pebbles.”

“Why?” Harry says, chest tightening up at the way Louis’ face doesn’t change, still glazed with that odd amusement.

“It was never my place to have my nose in a book,” Louis says. “I used to stay up all night and wait for him to go to bed because I was too scared to risk reading while he was awake. I would steal books from the library all the time, peel the stickers off them and hide them under my shirts, read all through the night and then bring them back the next day before he could figure it out. Sometimes he caught me though, or mom found them if she was changing my sheets.”

“It drove him insane when I wouldn’t listen to him. He’d get so mad,” Louis says absently, swallowing. “His only son, away with the faeries, y’know. A daydreamer instead of a fisherman.”

Harry doesn’t know what to say, can only watch the emotions shift over Louis’ face, the pain that slowly rises up in his eyes, emerging from that window glaze he always keeps the curtains shut over. 

“He never let me forget it, either,” Louis continues quietly. “The sacrifices he’d made for us, the stories he told me about the war, and there was–. There was so much pressure, when my sisters started to come along. I had this family around me that were going to depend on me, and every time we took the boat out all I could think about was getting off. And every time he hit a book out of my hands he’d call me a failure of a son, y’know, and it tore my ma apart, seeing that, because she felt like failure as well, couldn’t even look at us kids sometimes when we played with other children on the beach.”

“I’m sorry,” Harry says, but Louis just shakes his head.

“I couldn’t understand it,” Louis says. “And what I did understand, I hated. Dad used to say that every time I read my sisters a story I was poisoning their heads with it, giving them imaginations they didn’t need, that’d make them want to do things they weren’t supposed to do. All I ever did when he wasn’t around was read to try and feel something other than guilty, to escape.”

“I know how that feels,” Harry admits, meek. “To want to get away, and you sort of lose yourself in this other world that doesn’t really exist. But it’s real, to you.”

In the quiet, Harry tries to get his mind to catch up with the way his chest is aching, imaging Louis as a boy, inquisitive and with his nose buried in a book, only for that to be taken away. He can’t understand it, not fully, but he thinks he’s beginning to, this rigidity and sterile force that seems to keep everything that surrounds this place in brittle boxes, the way that Louis seems to be wandering on the outside with his hands up against the walls and no way to see in.

“I wanted to be a teacher,” Louis says softly. “I remember I told my mom that, that I wanted to write novels and read all day, that I wanted to leave Cape Breton and go to a university in the city, or in the States. I thought she might–. That she might understand, or be proud of my ambition.”

He sits forward and tucks his hands under his thighs, gaze lowered. “I feel like we all have this fire in our bellies when we’re kids, this passion to explore things and get obsessed with these fantastical ideas. And to keep carrying that fire, to cradle it and keep it from going out, it’s hard, y’know. And even if you keep it burning the candles got to melt away some time. Nobody ever shows you how to replace the wick.”

Harry thinks of his own little flame, snubbed out before he even got a chance to play with the fire. There’s something that makes him so inexplicably sad, picturing that puff of smoke, the moment it dawns that there’s nothing left to keep the chest warm. He can’t pinpoint it now, but it washes over him slowly, this realization that he couldn’t nurture that flame, that Louis did everything he could to try and keep his own alight. It feels like an ending point, this transcendence between the fuzzy innocence of everything childhood is supposed to be, and the strange, brutal truths that start to overlap into a life whenever the world deems it time.

There’s more to this story, Harry knows, Louis just letting him peer through the deep water at surface level, but even this, the skim of the foamy wake to a barrelling, crushing wave, has his chest feeling weighed down with the heft of the water. The fact that Louis is sharing this at all feels personal enough to leave Harry breathless. 

“What about you? Where’d you grow up?” Louis asks, cautious. Harry has to take a moment to answer the question, because the more he thinks about it, the more it seems to swell in his chest, the hurt, the phantom feeling of something he can’t quite picture in its entirety.

“Northern England,” he says. “I lived on a farm in the countryside.”

“What was that like?” Louis says. 

“I, um,” Harry stutters, scratching awkardly at his jaw. “I don’t remember very much of it. I was outside a lot, and we had a few animals we took care of. I mostly remember it being very quiet, simple, you know. It was simple.”

The words are a miniscule speck in the cluster of thoughts zipping around his brain, but Louis regards him softly, this curious, furrowed smile washing over his face.

“That’s it?” he says, but it’s gentle. “What about New York?”

Harry looks out to the water. “What about it?”

“You said that you were from there, when we first met.”

Harry’s stomach curls at the memory, the rush of the wind, the piercing whip of Louis’ words, his sharp eyes, the _Mary-Rose_ and the water on his cheeks and feeling like he’d never been more out of his depth, more terrified, so unsure of absolutely everything. And he had said that, he knows. And it was a lie, because he couldn’t even bring himself to think about a time before that apartment, those memories lost to the ache of wanting to remember nothing at all over even having an inkling of something good.

“I lived there for a little while,” Harry says eventually. _A long while. So achingly long._

“Did you like it?”

Harry contemplates the question, toe sweeping back and forth over the rough deck. “I don’t think I’ve ever hated anything more than that place.”

The wind blows his hair across his forehead. He stares down at his hands, the tiny bruise and scars accumulated there, veins flushed blue and purple. He can feel the weight of Louis looking at him, this heat on his neck, and he knows what that pressure is because he feels it within himself, knows Louis is thinking _why_ , _why did you go all that way, why are you here_ , but Harry can’t even bring himself to look up right now, let alone start to answer those questions. 

“And how do you feel now?” Louis says, so softly. Harry picks at the edge of his fingers, jaw working when he swallows. He can’t pinpoint the sensation in his chest, then, but it feels like a wedge is lodged between his lungs, and he can’t tell if the feeling is good or bad, just that it alters the way he breathes, makes him look up to where Louis is still watching him.

“Different,” Harry says, unable to find a string of words that melt together to say what he really means. “I feel different.”

-

Something shifts.

The nights spent by the fire, once stoically quiet, now filter through soft murmurs of conversation. Harry thinks back to the bar nights, the sticky illness he felt when they’d both drink until their eyes closed, and only then would they whisper back and forth, words falling from their mouths only because the alcohol had finally made them lax enough to do so. But now, sitting side by side on the couch with tea steaming, Louis’ feet up on the coffee table, there will be snippets of quiet words, a comment here and there mixed in with the rustle of pages turning.

“I’m thinking of setting up some lobster traps soon,” Louis says one night, his profile outlined gold. 

And Harry reads the intent there, the question in Louis’ eyes when he glances Harry’s way. _Are you staying for the spring?_

“What about the haddock?” Harry asks.

“They tend to drift off after winter,” Louis says, “and I haven’t been lobster fishing for a while. The money is better.”

There’s something in his expression that tells Harry the money isn’t the reason Louis cares, or the reason he’s asking, and the fact that there’s something outside of that, that inadvertently, maybe, he’s asking Harry to stay, has the heat of the fire brushing his cheeks. 

“You could show me how to do it,” Harry says. Louis’ smile is faint.

“Sure, sailor,” he says, and Harry wants to bury his face in his book at the unannounced swell of warmth that gathers around his neck. He doesn’t know where it comes from, or what it means, just that it has him sinking into the cushions and laughing when Louis does, soft, under his breath, barely even there.

There are these little slices of time out on the water, too, when Harry will help reel in a net and he’s concentrating on the tangles, trying to blow his hair off his face because it’s getting longer, now, once short fringe dipping over his eyebrows and a bit of a mess where it’s short at the sides, and when he glances up through the strands caught in his lashes Louis will already be watching him, motions of his own fingers slow.

“What is it?” Harry says, and Louis bites his bottom lip into his mouth as he looks away.

“Nothing,” he says, simple. “Nothing.”

And so it goes, as they walk up along the beach and Harry follows the imprints of Louis’ feet in the sand, and Louis turns his head to look over his shoulder, and he’ll say _what are you doing?_ It’ll take a moment for Harry to regain his footing as he flushes, but there’s a moment of amusement between them, and he’ll say _nothing_ , composing himself and shoving his hands into his pockets, something flickering in his chest when Louis rolls his eyes as he smiles. 

He watches Harry tie a knot, quick and easy as he loops _Arlo_ back up to the pier, and Harry says _what?_ and Louis shrugs as he finishes fastening his own rope, the _nothing_ falling from his lips in a short laugh. It becomes a back and forth, sprinkled intermittently between looks, between conversation.

And Harry knows what nothing feels like, has felt that empty ache for so long that to feel nothing is almost a permanence, to have that hollow, detached part of himself always carved out in his chest; and he can’t help but think, each time that word passes between them, that _nothing_ has never felt like this. This is something all brand new, something he doesn’t have a name for yet, and maybe it’s destructive of him to be scared of something that makes him feel the opposite of the nothing he’s so used to, unsure if he wants to even bother with giving that warm flush the time of day.

But there’s an ease in Louis’ features, some days, when they trudge through the bleak morning towards the wharf, and Harry will trace Louis’ footsteps with this almost childish giddiness that appears from seemingly out of nowhere, and it makes Louis laugh, a sound he hasn’t heard much of since their meeting. And he likes it, the laughter. Knowing that something he’s done is enough to make Louis’ mouth twitch, to make his own mind drift away from the hurt, even if it’s just for a little while. 

-

He wakes wet-eyed and hazy and the lounge is pitch black, a silver strip framing the curtain, nothing more than a dull breath coming from the dead fire. A few cracks of red through the soot, nothing more, and Harry sits up with a hand over his heart as he swallows thickly. His pulse is jumping against his neck. He brings his knees up to his chest, leans his head down, and tries to breathe against the heat that crowds behind his eyes.

If he thinks hard enough, he can still trace the details of his dream, the unusual length of the hallway, the way the walls moved around him as he walked, how the wood warped and changed and the door never seemed to be coming closer despite the shrieking shift of everything around him. And then there was a voice, soft and familiar, calling out to him. Paintings falling off the walls, and the shattering of glass, a piercing sound that’s still ringing lightly, the thing that’s forced him to jolt awake.

The house is quiet, just the lap of the waves outside. Harry throws back the blanket with a shudder and shuffles into the kitchen. The water is freezing cold, glass like a pinprick in his palms, but he drinks all of it with a rasping gulp, trying to settle himself into some state of calmness. Maybe he could relight the fire, light a candle and hold it close and read whatever book he’s left half open on the floor from last night.

But then he sits back on the couch and the walls feel like they have eyes, and the insistent pressure to move becomes too much. 

There’s an old notepad flung across one of the counters in the kitchen. 

_Gone for a walk. Meet you at the wharf. - H_

He’s quiet about it when he lets the front door fall locked behind him, and immediately the cool sea wind brushes up over his cheeks, slipping into the gaps where his hood is turned up. There’s no rain, but he feels like having his face tucked away. The waves are black and the wake is tipped silver, and when he touches the sand it’s with a soft _hush_ , footsteps like little whispers as he curls in his shoulders and starts to walk up the beach.

There’s not a single light on. It occurs to him slowly that it could be the middle of the night, the sky still inky and clouded over, no stars shining through the thick mass that will no doubt splinter and drip dewy across Cape Breton once the sun starts to come up. For now, he holds the dew in his eyes, vision slightly blurred as he fumbles his way along the horseshoe. 

It’s unsettlingly cold in the rusted kitchen. Before he flicks on the light he’s sure he sees the puff of his own breath, and then the dull lamp flickers, a hollow skim of yellow-white barely brushing the dusted countertops. There’s grit stuck to the corners of his eyes as he falls into an old chair, shoulders and neck aching. He shuts his lids and tries to stop the remnants of the dream from blurring into the real memories he’s already got. 

By the time the sun starts to come up, weak on the horizon, Harry feels distant and hazy with his arms looped over his turning stomach. He has to go meet Louis but he has this strange, twisting urge to trudge upstairs and curl himself under the old sheets, to hide, to start all over. The thoughts he hoped he’d pushed down are swelling up again, and he realizes now that they never left, that a distraction can only last for so long before it falls apart again. All its taken is a whisper in a dream, a casual, cruel reminder of all the things he’s been trying to forget, and with that comes the guilt of wanting it to disappear in the first place, that heavy feeling in the pit of his stomach that feels like a stone.

At the wharf, he waits under the confines of _Arlo’s_ shelter, watching the waves shift in the water. This way, he doesn’t have to watch the bustle around the _Mary-Rose_ , the prying eyes, the sneers, and it’s easier to tune it all out, to listen to the hollow, dull _thunk_ of the little boat gentling against the side of the pier while he waits. His mind drifts then, wonders if Louis got the note, if he peered into the living room to see the fire dead and the blanket left flung haphazard and rumped over the cushions, the almost empty cup of cold tea on the coffee table, the overturned waterglass in the sink. If he thought of Harry, the same way Harry’s now thinking of him.

The sun is gentling up when Harry hears the first smattering of footsteps, _Mary-Rose_ already drifting out into the distance. Boots clunk, that waft of smoke, and Harry closes his eyes for a moment at the familiarity, at the soft _morning, sailor_ Louis greets him with as he swings himself down into the boat. 

When Harry opens his eyes again, he pauses.

Louis is untying the ropes and untangling the nets, coat shiny-red in the pale light, and everything about it is familiar, the way he’s moving, the shift of his shoulders as he pushes _Arlo_ out into the water. And usually Harry would be helping, would already have the ropes tied and tucked away, but. 

“What?” Louis says softly, regarding Harry with caution as he fumbles a rope into a compartment, eyes downcast, and Harry is a little stuck on him, the sharp line of his sloping jaw, and the new starkness of his eyes, and the dewiness of his scar. And the smooth, shiny-wet sheen that’s glazed over his cheeks, his beard nowhere in sight save for a light dusting of stubble just under his chin, these little slips he’s missed. “Tell me it’s not that bad.”

“No, its,” Harry shakes his head, finally standing and trying to catch his breath a little. “You look…”

 _Exactly the same, but so different all at once._ This way, Harry can see all these new undertones, the pink flush that clings to Louis’ face where his skin has gone sensitive against the seawind and the salt, the cut of his cheekbones and the column of his once shrouded neck. He seems younger, somehow, but maybe that isn’t what really feels different. Like this, there’s a new openness to Louis’ features that Harry hasn’t yet seen. He’s so used to seeing the cutting gaze of Louis’ eyes from the side, the way he tucks in and hides and uses that grit to push. But now that isn’t there, not in a way Harry can see from the outside.

“You’re doing absolutely nothing for my confidence,” Louis says flatly, but his teasing is light, what could be the ghost of a smirk on his mouth as he steers them out over the bobbing reef.

“You look great,” Harry says, more blurting the words than anything else. “It’s, um. Bright.”

“Bright?” Louis laughs. “O-kay.”

Harry feels himself flush. He doesn’t understand why its feels so hard to speak right now, to not embarrass himself. He keeps his head ducked once they’re out on the water, but can can’t help the sneaking glances he keeps sending Louis’ way now that he’s close enough, gaze drifting over his jaw and the undertoned pink of this cheeks, the way that rosy colour brightens when he glances up and sees Harry already watching him back. 

It really does feel like looking at someone new, and Harry almost misses the ragged comfort of the beard, the familiarity, but the vulnerability of this, of Louis shedding a layer, him standing here beside Harry now with a nervous lilt to his movements, abolishes the yearn Harry has for that sense of comfort. Because he still feels it, that trust, maybe even more so now, because when Louis glances up, Harry sees it reflected back. A safety, something without judgement that’s shared between them, something that says _I’m here._

And that night, the two of them elbow deep in soap at the sink, Harry watches the orange lamplight play oil-slick and warm over Louis’ face, the new ways that shadow catches the slopes and the edges. Behind them, Elvis is humming low and gentle through from the lounge, water lapping quiet and wet outside, the brush of the teatowel, a soft hum, the kettle on the stove as it starts to steam. 

And then further below that ebb of sound, whisper soft and hidden somewhere distant in Harry’s brain, is that same low voice he heard out on the stoop, sitting and watching the water, watching _Arlo_ drift in close. _Louis. Louis. Louis._

_You can’t leave. You don’t want to leave. You like it here._

_You like him._

-

Spring comes calm and quiet. It seems that one morning, Harry is waking to the living room blushed its usual dark blues, and then the next, he cracks open his eyes and sees a thin, iridescent yellow sneaking through the crack in the curtain, and when he parts the fabric and blinks sleepily out to the waves, the early morning is breaking blonde and feeble-thin on the horizon, the barrels at the shoreline translucent where sun-rays reach for the sand. 

It’s a gradual thing, this transition, and most magnificent of all is the rise of the sun once they’re out on the water, when the grey slate that Harry is so used to, black slowly drifting into the dreary, drab blue, is instead filtered here and there with streaks of yellow, foggy like pollen, like a mist, and then there are burnt oranges on the clearer days, fine wisps of peach that hug the undersides of the clouds at first light. That dark blue still clings, an intrinsic piece of Cape Breton’s palette, but these soft, interwoven moments of colour are dreamy and all brand new, and each morning brings a new flush, a new tint, a new pattern in the clearing clouds. The chill is taking longer to wear away, as is the wind, the biting white caps that still gnash the water in the distance, but Harry finds he doesn’t mind that so much when the sun comes up like an orange disk, when he can see that light skimming towards them atop the water.

 _Arlo_ putters quietly, he and Louis facing the sun as they float towards it, and each time Harry looks over to him, the new light on his face, he feels that shift in his chest again, that wedge between his lungs. And Louis will look back at him sometimes, mouth quirked as their eyes meet, and they both don’t say a word, just watch each other, then watch the sky, both content in the quietness. 

The lobster traps almost seem too big for _Arlo’s_ little deck, their frames wood-soggy and a little splintered, and it had been an effort at first to piece them back together. They’d spent a day nailing them into shape, securing the mesh, Louis guiding Harry with careful hands to avoid splinters, to make sure he missed his thumb when he brought the hammer down. He’d shown Harry how to set them, how to tie on the buoys, and that first morning he watched them bob in the water as they drifted away, left there to rest until the next morning.

Setting the traps leads them to the deeper water, the usually distant silhouette of the _Mary-Rose_ and her company not so distant now. They take the same route out to the water most mornings. Harry can tell it irks Louis, the way _Arlo_ treks in the wake of the bigger boat, the way their traps come up empty when they can hear the rejoiced shout of Sully and his crew just across the waves. 

Still, it’s something new, and the slow shift of the season seems to bring with it a new air, a new motion for Harry to fixate himself on. And it feels somewhat okay, to do that. He’s starting to feel further away from the things he left behind, and that thought used to terrify him, and maybe it still does, really. Maybe he’s just gotten better at pushing that fear down. 

“What’ve you got today?”

Harry glances up from the page. His thumb is in the margin, and across the deck, Louis is laying an old rag along _Arlo’s_ side, gloves hanging from his pocket. It’s a peach day, slowly turning a lighter blue, clouds hugging only the edges of the horizon, and it fuzzes the edges of everything all soft. 

“ _Gatsby_ ,” Harry says, and Louis hums. “You don’t like it?”

“I do,” Louis says. He slips the gloves from his pocket. “Despite my better judgement that Fitzgerald seems like a bit of a prick.”

Harry’s lips quirk. “It’s a good story.”

“Aside from the fact that Nick Carraway is the most unreliable narrator to grace a bookpage, I’d agree,” Louis says, reaching for the rope.

“I think that’s what makes it good, in some ways,” Harry says, watching as Louis starts to haul in a trap, rope piling up behind him the harder he tugs on the line. “It kind of leaves you to wonder more about what they were all really like, in the end.”

“I suppose,” Louis says. He voice strains a little as he straightens, the trap almost at the surface now. “Though I don’t know if–. Oh, _Jesus_.”

Harry straightens, book set aside as he rises to stand. Louis is looking down at the water, mouth pressed into a thin line, and as Harry joins him, he sees why. The lobster trap is mangled, the centre of it entirely caved in like something has been slammed directly on top of it, like a pair of boots have sunken through the mesh and left it peeling away from the frame. Floating on the surface, it looks lifeless, like a pile of rubbish caught up on a hook.

Louis slowly tugs it up and over onto the deck. They stare down at it in silence for a moment.

“Fucking Sullivan,” Louis curses, hands on his hips as he casts his gaze back out over the water. The _Mary-Rose_ is distant, already retreating back to the wharf for the day. Harry follows Louis’ gaze, then looks back down at the splintered frame.

“Why would he do something like that?” he says softly. “I don’t understand it.”

“Because he’s a cunt,” Louis says. “He and his brood of merry men have got nothing better to do in their little lives than to make other people miserable.” 

Absently, Louis nudges the edge of the trap with his boot, hands back on his hips as he takes in a slow breath. Harry watches him and bites his tongue. He has questions, things he wants to know, what happened between them all to cause this great divide. But it’s not his place, and he won’t pry, no matter how badly he wants to understand this. Maybe it’s better that he’s left in the dark.

“Let’s check the rest of the traps,” Louis sighs, and he leans down to untie the knot fastened to the wilted frame. With a huff, he hauls the broken trap up and over the side of the boat.

Together, they watch it slowly sink down into the murky water. Harry tries not to imagine his stomach sinking along with it.

-

 _Arlo_ remains stationary for a few days, after that morning. Each trap they pulled up had indeed been smashed inward, some with a few lobsters trapped inside, their shells cracked and splintered and their innards squished grotesquely against the mesh. It had been sickly, pulling at the rope and seeing them like that, so intensely cruel that Harry had to turn away after the first time, seeing the haddock and the knife and the red water again, and then feeling worse upon realizing he’d forgotten about it in the first place, ignorant to the death of the animals around him, and he doesn’t know what to do with that thought, just helps Louis cut the traps loose and throw them overboard, not a word or mention between them of attempting to do any repairs. 

All the sudden, Harry feels adrift, and he knows Louis is the same, knows there’s something else bubbling beneath the surface when they’re on the wharf in the morning, watching the _Mary-Rose_ load up and putter out into the distance, Sully’s smile saccharine and sharp when he sends them a little wave. Louis waits with his arms crossed over his chest, smokes two and a half cigarettes, then swivels on his heel and marches back up the pier, Harry following with his head ducked, hands deep in his pockets. 

He doesn’t know what to think, what to feel, and maybe the gentle welcome of spring had just been a facade after all, a clever trick that Cape Breton’s pulled over them. In the kitchen, their backs leant against the counter while they wait for the kettle to boil, Harry stares at his toes and curls them into his boots, Elvis crooning in the space between them. Louis won’t meet his eye, either, and it almost feels like there’s suddenly an invisible wall between them, a strange, unprecedented intensity that Harry can’t read.

And when they do lock eyes, Harry can’t see past that cold glass. Like a two-way mirror.

He walks in the afternoons, still, when Louis disappears and Harry feels like he might go insane waiting on the stoop with a book cradled in his palms, flicking back and forth through the yellowed pages because he can’t concentrate enough to absorb anything of substance, skimming over _the proud and sinister dream of being nothing, of being always something other than I am_ and _it was a childish, empty choice_ and _it was out of reach._

This goes on, a pitter-patter back and forth, and then a spring day comes with a flirtation of rain and low cloud, swell whipped up with winter’s final fury, and when Harry knocks on Louis’ door he’s met with cautious, tired eyes, a wan smile.

“Let’s go get a drink,” Louis says, stepping out of the doorway so that Harry steps back, the click of the lock final, and Harry lets Louis lead the way down onto the sand, the two of them side by side as they cross the beach, hoods tucked up around their faces against the mist. 

It’s quiet at the bar, warm, something all fuzz and mellow spinning on the record player. Harry only has a moment to feel any sense of apprehension before locking eyes with Fergus, his face set as he stares them down, as they take a seat at the end of the bar. Harry watches the light play over Louis’ face, the way he doesn’t say a word as Fergus sets their glasses down in front of them heavily, sloshes alcohol messily over the side as he pours. There’s a loaded look, a twitch of a jaw, and then Louis folds, eyes flicking down to his glass as Fergus backs away. 

The whiskey is familiar, the smell and the taste and the touch of it over Harry’s tongue, and he listens to the dark hum of _round and round the burning circle_ that floats gentle over the speakers. Louis’ ankle brushes his. Stays there.

“I’m sorry about the lobsters,” he says softly, still looking down into his glass. He stirs the dark liquid there absently. “It’s a horrible thing.”

“Don’t be,” Harry says, just as soft. Across the room, there’s the sharp crack of a cue, a gentle murmur of laughter and clinking class. “It wasn’t you.”

Louis glances up at him. “It was all of us.”

Like this, under the bar lights, thick shadow finds home along the curves of Louis’ face, one side hugged dark with it, the other still honey-toned, and Harry is caught by it, the frame of lashes in his steady eyes, the thin line of his mouth. It takes a moment for the words to sink in, but when they do Harry can only nod, as much as it sickens him to do so. Because Louis is right, really, even if Harry doesn’t want to admit it, even if he feels sick at admitting the very fact. 

They drink at the same time, finishing their glasses, and Fergus drifts over to fill them again without another word. They’re mirrors of each other, this way, both with their elbows leant on the bar, a glass full in front of them, shoulders hunched in, red and yellow coats gone all strange-shiny under velvet light. The place where Louis’ ankle rests is warm. One by one, they work slow and silent through each drink. It isn’t until late that the bar becomes busier, the snooker table crowded with bumbling, salt-cracked bodies, the few stools at the end of the bar all occupied. 

Beside Louis, an empty stool remains all night.

Harry’s hazy when the door opens again, that rain smell creeping distant into his senses, and he can feel the presence of them like a strange shadow in a hallway when it’s late at night, that impending, heart-pumping rush that somehow feels numb all at once. And he doesn’t even think about it, really, when he hears boots approaching, when the stool beside Louis is finally occupied by a familiar, snarking face, the sea-air and the wet of fish drifting towards them.

“Evenin’,” Sully says, and he leans one arm up on the bar, cracked face leant in his palm so he can stare at them both. “Fancy seeing you two round here, hm?”

Louis doesn’t respond, keeps his head down. Harry does the same. Behind them, there’s a buzz as men order their drinks, tap beer flowing and spirits glugging into ice-filled glasses, that weighty presence pushing further on Harry’s shoulders. 

“I was wondering where you’d gotten to,” Sully says absently, nodding his thanks when Fergus slides a beer to him across the bartop. He takes a long, loud sip. “Poor _Arlo’s_ been a bit neglected. What’s with that, Tomlinson?”

Again, Louis says nothing. He takes a sip of his drink and draws his finger repeatedly around the rim of his glass. 

“If I’m guessin’ right, I can bet you’ve been too busy getting cozy with our skipper here,” Sully says. Harry’s stomach curls, and it’s a mistake when he glances up at the name, when Sully grins full and shark-like back at him, knowing he’s got Harry caught. “And what’s this new look I’m seeing? All fresh-faced.”

When Louis doesn’t respond again, Harry can see the first wisps of frustration starting to pool at the corners of Sully’s eyes. He knocks the rest of his beer back and lets the glass land heavily against the bartop. Leans in close.

“I can smell it on ya, you know. Maybe it’s the aftershave,” Sully jokes, but it’s dark, taunting, more like a whisper. “ _Fruity._ ”

Louis’ finger stills on the rim of his glass.

“I don’t think I’ve seen you like this for a good few years, hm?” Sully continues, irking, inching closer, and Harry’s skin is prickling, something intense and shaky burning under the surface, and he can feel it radiating off Louis now, can see it in the clench of his jaw, his lowered eyes, his stillness. Something is building, something terrifying, and Harry doesn’t know what it is, or how it’s going to stop, or if anyone can feel it aside from him.

It’s a calm before a storm, something wound so tightly that just a whisper of pressure would be enough to make it explode.

And then Sully gets right in close, eyes hazy and smile lofty as he nudges Louis’ shoulder. “It’s too bad she’s not around anymore to keep you in check–”

Louis smashes his glass into the side of Sully’s face.

Harry almost falls out of his chair as it happens, quicker than a blink, than a whip cracking, and the bar all out explodes, this sudden flurry of screams and shouting. It happens so fast but it feels like everything is slowed down, like Harry can see each individual sparkling shard of glass as it splinters outward and showers the bar, leftover liquid spraying like a dew, the way Louis leaps forward out of his chair and takes Sully with him, the two of them toppling to the ground.

It’s manic. Harry barely has a second to process anything before Louis lands the first punch, stradling Sully’s chest as he lets his fist come down. It takes no time at all for the rest of the men in the bar to come forward, and suddenly they’re crowded in, Louis being thrown forcefully off Sully’s body despite his struggle, despite the kick he tries to land as he’s pulled away, and Harry watches in horror as Sully’s crew descends, as Louis is knocked back and the first hit lands and it’s too much, complete chaos, anarchy, bodies crowded and cowering in the corner.

Harry doesn’t know what he’s doing as he gets out of his stool, feels out of body when he shoves his way through the crowd, heart racing and tears in his eyes and he doesn’t feel like himself when he elbows another man out of the way, shoves and barges his way to Louis, who’s outnumbered and scrambling to get himself up off the floor. 

“Get off him!” Harry shouts, but it’s lost to the noise and the commotion, and then an elbow collides painfully with his jaw and he’s spinning, stumbling back, vision going wonky as someone grabs forcefully at the back of his coat and tugs him in too many directions, body jostling as he’s suddenly plucked from the crowd, Louis slamming into his side.

As they’re dragged out, he looks to the floor, and he feels the bile rise up in his throat at the sight there, Sully lying motionless with blood running rivets down the side of his now mangled face, shards of glass all shiny around him like a twisted snow angel, and there’s spilt alcohol everywhere, stools knocked over and things gone gritty and disturbed and too hot– 

Fergus shoves Harry out the back door, and he falls forward onto his knees immediately, chest heaving, rain already dusting the back of his neck as he tries to blink and breathe through the pain that’s pulsing down his face. He manages to stand in time to see Fergus shoving Louis up against the opposite wall, the brick grimy and disgusting. Louis’ lip is split, blood stained on his chin and the front of his sweater, a bruise purpling his eye.

“Are you fuckin’ _stunned?_ ” Fergus bellows, getting right into Louis’ face as he shouts, shoving him back into the bricks again and hitting him upside the head. “What in God’s fuckin’ name are you thinking!”

Louis touches his lip, then pulls his fingers away and looks at the blood there, the way it’s pooling from inside his mouth, too, face hazy and distant.

“I mean, Jesus _Christ_ , Louis,” Fergus says. He slaps his hand to his forehead, chest shuddering. “If he takes this to the Sheriff, you’re not getting out of it. They’ll fuckin’ take you away for good. You’ll do _time._ Are you hearing what I’m saying?”

“He was egging me on,” Louis says softly, eyes still downcast, fingers still at his lip. Harry backs himself up to lean against the wall behind him, breath rattling in his chest as his vision starts to clear properly, the adrenaline fading and leaving this awful, horrific swirling in his stomach.

“You provoked him!” Fergus shouts, and he shoves Louis’ chest again. “You–”

“I was just _sitting there_ ,” Louis finally snaps. “I did _nothing_.”

“You should have–”

“I’m sick of it! I’m fucking _over_ it,” Louis explodes, seething as he pushes Fergus out of his space, eyes wet. “I’m sick of taking it. Taking it, taking it, taking it. Always fucking _taking it_. And now it’s my fault? Now it’s my fault that a cunt like that finally got what was coming to him–”

“So you smash a fuckin’ glass over his head?” Fergus exclaims, voice edged with pure disbelief. “That was your grand plan? Jesus, Louis. He’s got a little one on the way, kids to look after–”

“Why is it _always_ my fault!” Louis screams. Harry flinches at how loud it is, at how wrecked Louis’ voice sounds, and Fergus takes a step back, both of them watching on at the way Louis’ face twists, the anger that curls up his fists as he points out to the water. “The wind could blow a fucking hurricane through this shithole and I’d be to blame. Everybody is always so ready to point the finger. And I’m just the easy target, aren’t I, Fergus? The psychopath with the scar that’s the source of every single problem anyone’s ever been too scared to deal with themselves. Isn’t that right?”

“No, no,” Fergus says, softer now as he digs his fingers into his eyes, rubs his hands down his face, then rests them on his hips as he shakes his head. “God, what would your dad say about this?”

“I don’t care about what he thinks of me,” Louis spits. “I never have, just like he never gave two shits about what I think of him. If he cared, he would have been here. He’s not here anymore.”

“I promised him I’d look out for you.” Fergus shakes his head again. “I promised your mother–”

“You aren’t their replacement!” Louis shouts. “Don’t you see how fucked up that is? That he left his brother to deal with the runt he rejected? Palming me off like I’m a fuckin’ pup about to go belly up–”

“That’s not what happened–”

“Oh, spare me,” Louis says. “It is, and you know it. He never wanted a thing to do with me, only to shower everything around me with pity and blame and pass it on to the sorry sod who was stupid enough to fall for it.”

“You don’t mean that,” Fergus says. “You know I care about what happens to you, and I know you, Louis. And you make it hard for yourself. You provoke that shithead in there. I understand–”

“You could never understand this!” Louis explodes, gesturing to himself. “Don’t even try to tell me you understand _anything_ that I’ve been through.”

Harry watches on silently, mouth agape. There’s still blood trickling from Louis’ split lip, and intermittently he wipes at it, his hand stained, eyes glazed with shaky wetness, face red. Harry feels like he shouldn’t be here, witnessing this. It feels like to much to take in, to process, and he can’t imagine what Louis is feeling, how this could feel, how to make the aching, crushing weight in his chest go away. He doesn’t realize he’s crying until he has to wipe at his eyes.

“You don’t know what it feels like to be called a monster,” Louis says, voice strained as he stares Fergus down. “To be called a murderer. To wake up and look in the mirror every day and believe the things people say about you, to hear the whispers and the abuse and the horrific, evil things people will let slip when they think you can’t hear. When they know you can and they don’t care about how much damage their words do.”

He points at his scar, pulls at the skin there. “Don’t stand there and tell me that you know how this feels. I’ve lost everything, _everyone_ that I cared about, all for being myself, for being a kid, for being different. For trying to give my sisters a better future than the absolute disaster that this place tries to pass off as a way off life. Sully’s had it out for me ever since his brother packed up and left–”

“You know that I never once believed any of that,” Fergus says sharply. “I’ve always been on your side, Lou.”

“Yeah, well,” Louis sniffs, wiping at his bloody mouth again, eyes downcast. “That’s no good to me now, is it.”

The rain is starting to come down harder. Inside, there’s still a commotion, a rush of voices and a woman crying, and in the distance Harry can hear the rumbling thunder of the swell pulsing on the beach. The desolation is like a thick blanket, suffocating as he tries to wade through it. With a slow, rattling breath, Fergus shakes his head and walks away, shouldering his way through the back door again, voice already calm and collected as he starts to address the room. 

It’s just them, backs against the wall. Harry wipes at his eye with his knuckle.

“We should go,” Louis says numbly, and then he just goes, just walks down the thin alley and back towards the beach, and Harry is helpless as he follows, stomach twisting each time he catches the glimpses of red on Louis’ hands.

He doesn’t know which of it is Louis’ and which is Sully’s. 

They don’t speak a word as they walk the beach. The sand has gone wet and gluggy, moonlight sharp and needling at their skin. Harry feels a step away from keeling over and emptying his stomach. It’s mechanical, the way they walk towards the house, parts of Harry’s consciousness slipping here and there, time seeming to jump all on it’s own, and then they’re up the stoop and in the kitchen and Louis has hoisted himself up onto the counter, spits blood into the sink and runs the screwed up tea towel beside him under a blast of cold water, eyes absent and dazed.

“Wait,” Harry says softly, barely a whisper, throat all scratchy. He crosses the room and takes the towel from Louis’ hands, shudders at how cold it feels, the chill of the water. He fumbles with the taps and sticks his hand under the spray, toes curling at the sharpness of it. Under the rush of the tap he can hear Louis’ breathing heavily. Soon, the water starts to heat, and once it scolds Harry lets the tea towel run underneath it, cupping it in his hands until it’s soaked through. “Warm water first, to clean the cut. Then ice.”

He stands between Louis’ legs and gently presses the towel up to Louis lip, trying not the notice the way he flinches minutely before he settles into the feeling, staring back at Harry with his mouth parted, back slumped. Gingerly, Harry brushes the rag down Louis’ chin, wiping away the crusted red there, dots it along his neck, his sweater, back up to the dewy split of his bottom lip. There’s only a single lamp on in the corner, barely brushing their bodies. It’s just an outline of dark gold, everything else in shadows. Softly, Harry reaches up and tilts Louis’ chin as he cleans the cut. Louis stares at him down the line of his nose, breath fanning against Harry’s wrist. 

“Do you remember,” Louis whispers, words muffled by the towel, by the quiet pressure of night, “when we were at the bar, forever ago. I asked you a question.”

Harry pauses, his thumb still gentle at Louis’ jaw. “Which question?”

“I asked you if you think I’m a bad person,” Louis says. “And you said no.”

Harry’s eyes fill. “I still think that.”

“You couldn’t possibly,” Louis whispers tightly. “You couldn’t look at me and think there’s a good bone in my body, after what I just did.”

“Trying to be the best versions of ourselves doesn’t always mean we do good things,” Harry says. “Doing good things doesn’t always make us good. I think that’s all subjective.”

“I was trying to be the best version of myself, and now I don’t have a family anymore,” Louis says, and Harry’s shoulders curl in, shaking his head as he fights the swell of tears. “I’ll never be good. I’ve never been anything other than a disappointment to everyone around me.” 

“That’s not true,” Harry presses, feeble and caught wet in his throat, and they’re still so close, their eyes shined, and Harry can’t help it when he lets the first tear go, hot and dewy where it clings under his chin. “You’ve done nothing but make me feel like I belong here, even when you feel like _you_ don’t. You’ve done nothing but take care of my feelings, and be patient, and kind, and I’ve seen the way you think you’re nothing. It’s not true. It’s just not true. You feel so far away from nothing, Louis.”

Louis hangs his head, Harry’s thumb shifting up, and he’s hesitant as he pulls it away. His vision keeps blurring and he can’t make it stop. When Louis finally looks up again, there’s something painful that flickers across his face. His brows pinch as he reaches out, tilts Harry’ jaw so slow. The feeling of it, something featherlight on his skin, has Harry’s eyes closing, mouth twisting as Louis presses down on the bruise he’s sure is already blooming.

“You’re hurt,” Louis says, voice cracked.

“I’m fine,” Harry says, but his chest hiccups and Louis shakes his head, face crumpling as he finally, finally, starts to cry.

“This is all my fault. All of it.”

It feels like it can’t possibly be real when Louis’ cheeks start to dew up with the hot flow of tears. Not Louis. Not strong, fast-as-a-whip Louis, Louis with his clenched jaw and the hand on Harry’s back and the snarl at anyone who gets too close, Louis with his quiet house and his books and the little boat on the wharf and the little book full of words. Louis who’s always seemed an unmoveable force, the man with his head tilted up, the fighter, the constant. And Harry realizes now he’s been reading it wrong all along, as he watches Louis collapse in on himself, the wet, caught sobs that he muffles as he brings his hands up to his face to hide.

Slow, cautious, heart in his throat, Harry reaches up and pulls Louis into a firm hug. He hears Louis’ pause of breath, the shake in his chest as he keeps himself still. His hand are still at his face, and Harry feels it when Louis starts to curl them into loose fists, when his chest shudders again as their head rest gently together. And then with another shaky breath, Louis’ arms wrap around Harry’s shoulders, locked together behind his head, and he holds on so tightly Harry can hardly move.

The tea towel is discarded beside them. Silver light pours in. Harry closes his eyes in the hopes he can get the tears to stop, instead focusing on Louis’ chest touching his as he breathes, the wet skin on his neck, the feeling of being so close to somebody else, of being so close he feels the hurt and the heartache like it’s passing between them on an electrical current. 

It’s quiet. The rain dots the windows.

-

The days that follow exist in a strange flux. It feels as though the entire weight of the sky is pressing down on Cape Breton’s beach, a gaping, dark-grey mass ready to swallow them all whole and leave them in a pitch darkness. The sea thrashes and the rain doesn’t stop but somehow, when Harry opens his eyes the following morning, cheek smudged against the worn fabric of the couch, the house is completely silent, still, not a whisper of sound aside from the low humming of the near-dead fire. 

It takes him a moment to move, just staring at the strip in the curtain with a hand curled loosely over his churning stomach. There’s a blankets over his shoulders, socked feet hanging over the edge of the cushions, a two-day old cup of tea sitting docile on the coffee table. It’s late morning, that strip of shell-pale light trying to pulse and spread like a palm across the room.

Harry closes his eyes and tucks his nose back into the armrest.

It isn’t until noon that he hears the slow shuffle of movement down the hall, the creak of the door, of floorboards under soft footsteps. The flick of a light. Water running in the sink. A moment of silence again. Harry sits up as Louis pokes his head into the living room, regarding Harry quietly.

His face is bruised, a dark, gloomy purple settled like a fogged storm cloud over his right eye, and Harry can see the sticky shine of his lip even from here, the place where it’s split trying to cover itself over. Louis looks drained, hollow, unsure of himself as he tucks his thumbs under the long arms of a stretched sweater. Eyes still rimmed red, hair matted, he turns away and makes for the kitchen, grabbing immediately for the kettle. 

Harry wonders if they’ll manage to speak about it. If Louis will open up to him again. If Harry will ever be able to erase the vivid image of Louis’ face crumpling, of their bodies tucked together, of Sully’s dazed, bloody face. He closes his eyes when he thinks of it, fingers curling firmer into his stomach, and stands.

Louis parts the curtains as Harry stumbles into the kitchen. The light here is all dust and pale, thin like a fragile bone. Harry watches the steam rise from the kettle, the thin nub of Louis’ wrist when his sleeve slips down, the way they’re both avoiding each other’s eyes. Louis wordlessly hands Harry his tea, and they rest with their backs against the counter, mirrors again, staring at the worn floor.

“I’m sorry,” Louis says, then, looking down at his toes. “I’m sorry for what I did. I’m sorry you had to see it.”

Harry says nothing. Maybe he should say _it’s okay,_ or _it’s fine_ , or another few words that he could mumble to help them move past this. But his head feels full of dust, and the words don’t come. And maybe that’s because he can really see it now, with the curtains open and the light touching the cuts and the bruises; he can see that the blurring edges between wrong and right are just that, a blur, a dangerous spectrum that he can’t seem to figure out, and maybe that’s for the best right now, to remain within that subjectivity, to try and see the things around him as they are, to not sort them into a box or trap them down.

And Louis seems to know it too, thumb touching a stuttered, uneasy rhythm against the side of his cup. It’s a terrible thing to have happened. It’s a bad, destructive thing. They both know it. And Harry can see that they both know how to be on the receiving end of that destruction, and that it’s time to acknowledge, now, that there are times they’ve been on the giving end, too, with or without that realisation. That the subjectivity doesn’t just favour the eye of the beholder.

So Harry says nothing, and he knows that’s what Louis needs. To just say the words, and to have this moment to be silent. For it to all be there in front of them, toes curled into their socks and their tea cupped in their hands, trying to work their way through all the details that are slowly filtering through their heads.

They don’t go to the wharf for the remainder of the week, and the flux continues. Harry is caught between staring at the lines of Louis’ face and feeling sick each time his cuts catch the light, caught between wanting to brush his knuckle against the side of Louis’ leg when they sit by the fire, and keeping his elbows tucked in tightly to his sides. At night, he hardly sleeps, curled under the blanket and listening to the crackle of the fire, and sometimes he hears the creak of the springs as Louis tosses and turns down the hall, both of them fitful and unable to do anything but stare up at the ceiling and wait for sleep to consume them. 

Some nights, Harry begs for sleep. The longer he’s awake, the longer he has to think about things he’s managed to push far away, and the problem is that those things are coming back to him blurry and transfigured, twisted and strange because he doesn’t quite remember the way they used to be in the first place. And the clearer memories, the clearer whispers and snippets of words and moving picture, those settle like stones in the pit of his stomach. 

Interlaced with that are snippets of the night at the bar, the way Sully had looked at them, the way he smiled, this glint in his eye that makes Harry’s stomach turn to think about. The way Louis and Fergus had shoved at each other, and how bare Louis had been, how explosive, the words that poured out running through Harry’s head like a mantra. _Monster. Murderer._

He turns violently onto his side and shoves his face into the cushion. Wills for sleep, for a blank slate, for nothing but quiet.

-

The weather stays tremulous for days at a time. The beach is a turmoil of wet sand and too-big waves, like the swell is bursting from it’s beds and trying to bury itself further up the shoreline, looming high and threatening, then coming down with explosive crashes, spitting foam and shaking their fists as they’re dragged kicking and screaming back out to sea. 

They’re eating breakfast together, feet accidentally knocking under the table, and then Louis looks to the window and bites his bottom lip into his mouth. “We should go down to the wharf, today.”

The dry toast in Harry’s mouth seems to turn to chalk. He chews it slowly as he regards Louis’ face. “We should?”

“I haven’t seen a storm like this for a long time,” Louis says quietly. He’s picking absently at his crusts, crumbs sprinkling the table. “Not in the spring. I just want to make sure _Arlo_ hasn’t come loose.”

Harry thinks of the little boat, helpless to the threat of the big swell. He hates to think of what they might find there, splintered wood or the pier in pieces, or worse, nothing at all. Just an empty space where the Cape Islander should be.

“It’ll be fine,” Harry says. “I’m sure nothing’s happened.”

“I hope,” Louis says quietly.

The rain isn’t torrential, but it’s getting close, the entire horseshoe a blur, the orange lights like tiny dots trying to fight their way through a dark fog. Harry tucks himself further into his coat and closes his eyes intermittently, prickling wind cutting at his cheeks. They’re drenched by the time they hit the wharf, trudging up the ramps and out to where the trawlers are clinging on for dear life, men scattered around the boats and tying new knots. The whole structure seems to groan with each sea-gust, and Harry feels a dangerous swoop of vertigo when it sways, hoping he’s imaging the shift of wood under his feet. He sticks close by Louis’ side.

Harry doesn’t think he’s seen the weather so dreadful since the day he arrived. White caps pulse towards them like fists, the impact shuddering up the structural beams, through their toes and up to their shoulders like a shiver. The ocean has a mind of its own, untamed and wild, and Harry tries not to let himself shake when he feels the rush of the water and the whip of the wind, face and hair drenched with sea spray as he and Louis trudge down the old steps to the pier.

 _Arlo_ bobs fervently back and forth in the water, miraculously unscathed. 

They set to work. Harry remains up on the pier with his knees to the wood, grabbing the ends of rope that Louis tosses up to him from below, and with quick hands they tuck _Arlo_ in close, trying to stop it from knocking back and forth so often, from pulling on its restraints and snapping them apart in the turmoil. Harry’s hands are red and rain-slick by the time Louis pulls himself back up onto the pier, both pale and drowned to their bones. 

“Let’s go,” Louis says, but it’s almost a shout, lost to the wind and the thrash of rain hitting the already gurgling water. 

It’s all Harry can think about now, getting rid of these sopping clothes and curling up in front of the fire. It feels like the weather is trying to physically pull at his skin, to peel back layers and scratch at his face and turn him inside out. Ahead, he can see the stained coats of fishermen still securing the trawlers, unloading their nets and gear up into boxes and tubs, work at a standstill. 

And he doesn’t really hear it, at first, as he follows Louis’ lead and keeps his head down, passing the trawlers with his hands dug deep in his pockets. But then there are heavy footsteps behind him, a jovial, cracked voice mixed with the rain.

“Oi, skip! I’m talking to you.”

Harry’s pulse quickens. He walks faster.

“I _said_ –” a lurch, a firm, squeezing hand around Harry’s arm. He jolts to a stop, eyes widening as he’s tugged backwards violently, swinging to face a wet, smiling Sully. “I’m talkin’ to you.” 

The panic clutches at Harry’s chest like a fist around his heart. The look on Sully’s face is empty, vacant, and Harry looks at the scars there, the slit along the side of his forehead, the still healing gash that pulls itself down his right cheek. His eyes are bloodshot and his skin is pale, veined blue, and Harry lets out a quiet sound as he tries to pull away, the vice grip Sully has on his arm growing painful, bone crushing.

“Let me go,” Harry says, sure it’s lost to the squalls as he tries to pull himself away. Behind him, he can hear Louis’ voice now, this sound of alarm as he turns and realizes what’s happening.

“No, no,” Sully laughs. “I don’t think I will, see.”

He looks manic, features blurred by the rain, and Harry tugs backwards again, feels Louis’ hand on his shoulder.

“Let go,” Louis says, dangerous and firm, but he’s keeping himself back, and Harry knows why. He’s trying to keep things calm. 

“You’ve caused nothin’ but trouble since you got here, you know that?” Sully says, and he drags Harry towards him so sharply that Harry stumbles, eyes growing hot as he tries to get away. But Sully won’t budge, just tugs him forward again, so that their faces are close. He looks dazed. “Do you see what he’s done to me, _huh?_ Do you see it, kid?”

“Stop,” Harry gasps, rain thrashing down. His arm feels like it’s on fire, but Sully won’t let go. “Please, _stop_.”

He’s aware of how still things have gone around them, fisherman watching on silently. Harry doesn’t know what to do, can barely think past the panic, and Louis is still there, a hand on Harry’s back to say _it’s okay, breathe, it’s okay, we’ll be okay_ , but Harry doesn’t know if it’s true, when he meets Sully’s eyes through the rainfall, the determined, terrifying look that he finds there. 

“My wife can’t even look me in the eye,” Sully says quietly, just for Harry to hear. Their noses pressed close. Harry closes his lids. “My kids, they don’t understand what happened to their dad.”

Harry’s eyes are hot, and he tugs backward again, desperate.

“I guess it’s ironic,” Sully says, prodding at his face with his free hand. “Just what you wanted, right, Tomlinson?”

“I never wanted–”

“You’re a monster,” Sully says, biting. “Everyone thinks you are, even our skipper here. I can see it. I saw it before you ever pushed Charlotte off that stupid excuse for a boat–”

“You’re wrong,” Harry says, and Sully stops, chest ballooning with a breath. His face is red, and as he stares Harry down, this fierceness in his eyes, Harry knows the words about to fall from his mouth aren’t wise, that they’d be better off stuck down in his chest. But he can feel Louis’ stillness, sees his wet eyes in the dark, and it shouldn’t be this way. It can’t be this way. “The only monster here is _you_.”

There’s a moment, just the squalls, and the rain, the bated breaths of the figures watching around them. And then something in Sully’s face shifts.

Growing up, Harry doesn’t really recall going to beach much. Maybe once or twice when he was little, watching the waves distantly, too afraid to go in. Instead, he put pebbles in the pockets of his trousers until his dad clipped him around the back of the head for doing so. Ice cream melting down his fingers, a vague memory of falling asleep with his head on his mother's shoulder as they rode the train back inland, summer setting, sun slanting through the dirty windows.

He’s read plenty about it, pools in Paris and the white sand in Greece, lakewater in English parks, the great American rivers. He’s lived as people on the sea, pirates, sailors, pressed his thumb into the pages and imagined himself there. And being here, learning the swell of the water, how to quell the rolling of his stomach, the brush of seafoam and the constant _hush_ of the waves lapping at the sand, it’s all seemed to make him more familiar.

He’s never felt anything more alienating, more terrifying, than his back hitting the water, than being swallowed up immediately by a wave.

He isn’t really sure if he registers what happens. It seems that one moment he’s staring into Sully’s heaving face, and the next there are hands on his chest and the winds whips around his head and it goes dark, so cold, this chill that stings like a needle being pushed through his stomach, into his spine, and right back out the other side. 

The water is slick, heavy like lead, crushes around him as he goes under. His arms flail uselessly, boots and coat weighing down his body, and the panic almost seemed muffled by the weight of it all, how dark it is, the thunderous pulsing of sound around him as the white caps roar overhead. He doesn’t know which way is up. His lungs feel gluggy and full and he keeps swallowing water and he doesn’t know how to get his legs to kick against the heaviness there, chest getting tighter and tighter with each passing second, veins gone blue, eyes bulging as he cries out into the darkness.

He’s suffocating.

There’s no sunlight to break through the surface. Harry can feel himself sinking. His body is locked up tight, and it seems like the more he tries to struggle his way back up, the more his limbs resists the pull of the water, like a clever fisherman’s knot. 

He feels helpless, alone, drifting uselessly, and it’s a sudden, chilling thing, when he starts to hear voices, to see the blurry figures in the hallway, the splash of tea on the floorboards, fine china split into little pieces. An open window and a hand on his shoulder, the mess of the kitchen, the destroyed room down the hall, the doors left open, and then there’s more, the click of a clock, a sunray through a window, the feeling of slow-growing wheat under his palms. 

He can hear her voice, now, haunting and quiet, something he’s missed so much that his entire mind goes blank the moment the words reach him, a precious hum, the thrashing of the water far away. He closes his eyes, body finally going still, the rope gone loose, drifting– 

Something tugs sharply at the back of his neck.

The darkness starts to filter with odd patches of grey and navy, foam floating up around him, and then the chill starts to worsen, ice spreading out from his chest into his arms, down his legs, to his toes and his fingers as the rush of water starts to become a flurry. Things aren’t quiet anymore. He can hear it all, the roar of waves, thunder rumbling.

When they break the surface he barely remembers to breathe. 

“Hey, _hey!_ ” There’s a hand on Harry’s cheek, fingers firm. He can feel something behind him, maybe a beam from the wharf, and his back knocks against it as a swollen wave pushes up under his chin. He swallows another burst of seawater. “Look at me. Please, fucking _look at me_.”

He reaches out blindly.

“Harry.” The hand on his cheek shifts, holding his jaw, thumb pressed into his teeth through his skin. “God, please open your eyes. _Please, please–_ ”

Harry hadn’t realized they’re still closed. He doesn’t remember closing them. It’s dark. He doesn’t know what’s happening to him.

There’s another rush of water, a stuttered, shaking breath, and then there’s more voices, more hands touching him, tugging him, his body limp as he’s lifted up. It feels colder out of the water, like the ocean had created a pocket for him to fall into a blissful sleep. The wind is blisteringly cold, that needle still stuck through his insides, twisting now, making his chest hurt as he tries to breathe. 

“–his side, get ‘im on his side–”

“Somebody get a towel–”  

Rough wood on his cheek, stomach lurching as he’s tipped. More hands. The vibration of footsteps. It’s still raining. He’s so, so cold.

A hand finds the back of his neck, fingers light and careful in his hair. “Harry?”

The fingers drag gentle through the curls at the back of his head, and just for a second the wind and the rain disappears, nothing but the quiet flickering of a melting candle, soft words falling like mist, _never learn bad ways; do your work with a good will_ , the window cracked to let in the spring air, the lingering smell of the day out in the field. A kiss to his forehead, a gentle breath, and then darkness.

The needle that punctures his stomach slides out through the other side. His back lurches as he throws up a gurgle of seawater. It rocks his whole body, and he’s gasping before he can stop himself, bleary-eyed and broken, entire body shaking as the wind picks up. There’s a foul-smelling rag over his shoulder. As he looks around, he sees the collection of old boots surrounding him, watching on, and then he looks in front of him, feels the hand in his hair curl tighter. Louis.

“Hey, love,” Louis whispers. Harry feels his face crumple. “Hey, you’re alright. It’s alright.”

“Louis,” Harry croaks, cheek to the wharf, his insides still churning. 

“Sh, it’s okay,” Louis says. He brushes Harry’s hair back from his forehead, and it’s then, as he dips closer, that he notices the water on Louis’ own hands, that his clothes are drenched. He isn’t wearing his coat, hair hanging wet and icy over his face. “Just breathe for a sec, just breathe.”

Harry tries. His ribs feel like bolts come loose, rattling around inside his chest, threatening to puncture his water filled lungs and drown him from the inside. Louis is blue-veined, shaking as he kneels beside Harry. His hand doesn’t leave Harry’s body, in his hair for a moment, then warm on his shoulder, then back to his neck, brushing the baby hairs by Harry’s ear. Harry wants to cry. He thinks he might be, but he isn’t sure. He can’t really feel anything, too cold to register the places his own body touches the wharf.

“Can you sit up?” Louis asks. His voice sounds breathy, rattly, like it hurts for him to speak, and Harry can see that his eyes are wet now, misty as he helps Harry up, a palm steady between his shoulders. 

Harry hunches into himself. There are still men crowded around them, watching on silently. He wonders where Sully is, the very thought making him curl into himself, eyes closed. Louis’ thumb presses into his back.

“He’s gone,” one of the men says quietly. Harry sees Louis look up. “Made sure of that.”

“Thank you,” Louis whispers. He wipes at his eyes with the heel of his palm. 

The silence feels heavy, full of unspoken words, and as Harry finally looks up and around him, into the ruddy, salt-cracked faces of the men he’s been ducking his head against for months now, he feels something strange open up inside his chest at the way they’re looking back, the stoic, sullen silence between them all, like they’ve seen a ghost.

One claps their hand gently down onto Louis’ shoulder as he walks away. Soon, heavy boots retreating cautiously, it’s just he and Louis left huddled together, Harry feeling so out of it that it hurts to blink, freezing down to his marrow. Louis still has a hand on his back.

“We need to get you back home,” he says, standing on shaky legs. Harry stares up at him, at the hand that’s outstretched. “Fresh clothes and a warm bed.”

Gingerly, bones like the water that surrounds him, Harry rises and lets the grotty towel on his shoulders fall to the wharf. Louis’ hand is rough in his own. Each step feels like a struggle, Harry’s whole body shivering and wet, clothes sticking to his skin. He doesn’t feel present in his own head, barely registers the moment they hit the sand, the slow, staggered way he pulls himself up the stoop, the prickling chill of cold tiles under bare feet. The hot, chugging rush of the shower, steam filling the room, then Louis’ hands on the hem of his sweater, gently helping to tug it off. It lands in a sopping mess in the corner, followed by his pants and underwear, and then it’s just him and the spray, the blue-purple tone of his skin slowly flushing red from the heat of the water, almost a scald as it cascades down around him.

Through it all, he remains quiet and still, staring at the spot the water curls towards the drain.

When he pulls back the curtain, there are fresh clothes on the sink, a large, hole-ridden sweater and too-small pajama pants. He avoids his reflection, tugs the sweater over his head. His eyes grow hot at the smell there, that childhood, stuck-in-the-drawer smell, and then beneath that, something familiar. Louis, cigarette smoke, herbal tea, a warmth that doesn’t really have a name.

When he gently pries the bathroom door open, Louis is waiting in the hallway. He’s still dripping wet himself, obviously freezing, but he reaches for Harry the moment he sees him, guides him gently down the hall and into his bedroom. There’s a candle lit on the small bedside table, a cup of steaming tea. The blanket from the couch is thrown over the top of the sheets already there. 

“Here, c’mon,” Louis says, soft, gentle as he pulls back the covers and lets Harry underneath. He tucks the blankets up around his neck. Harry can feel his hair dripping wet along his skin, dampening the pillow, and he blames that for the way his skin prickles, not the brush of Louis’ hand against his jaw when he pulls the sheets up, the slow sweep of fingers that push Harry’s wet fringe back. 

Harry can feel his eyes getting hot, so he closes them. The darkness is almost worse, hearing the whisper of Louis moving, the light brush of his hands on Harry’s hip, by his leg, the strange yellow glow that disappears when Louis blows out the candle.

“Get some rest,” Louis whispers. His thumb brushes Harry’s eyebrow. Then, softer, distant, “You’re safe here.”

Harry keeps his eyes closed. The door clicks shut. A rattle. The gush of water down the hall. 

He feels like he’s still suffocating under the crushing weight of the waves.

-

It’s almost funny, how the the only thing he wants to forget is the one thing that he probably never will.

Her body never really looked at peace, but it did that morning. Harry remembers it well, remembers it down to the day, a chilly Sunday, window cracked because the clouds weren’t covering the sun yet, and the light itself felt almost balmy, and it felt nice to rest his tea on the sill and lean his elbows there, curled up with that worn book in his palms. It was still early, and he read for a little while. He didn’t sleep much the night before.

He didn’t really sleep much at all, the last year, looking back.

But the morning had been bright, the grey still far away, and he crossed the hall in socked feet and hummed soft under his breath, steaming cup of tea in one hand, _Black Beauty_ left propped open on the windowsill. He opened the door and took a sip of his tea and then he paused, when he saw her there.

He remembers it, his hand still on the doorknob. The startled, boyish _oh_ that left his mouth. And then the shattering of the teacup, the hot liquid pouring over his feet. He stepped in broken china and it hurt but he didn’t really feel it, then, didn’t notice he’d trecked blood through the apartment until the nurses arrived and screamed at the sight of the bloody footprints up and down the hall.

But that was later, when the grey came. It was still all bright when Harry touched her forehead, when he got close enough to see that her eyes were open, and she was so still. And that wasn’t what made him cry, because she’d been still for a long time. Her limbs were fluid, loose, eyes vacant and calm. She was gone.

And she wasn’t in pain anymore.

Harry doesn’t remember so much, after that. He thinks he remembers throwing things, trashing his room, pacing. He remembers sitting by the bed and crying until his head felt like it would implode, touching the centre of her cold palm and trying to remember what it felt like to be held by her, before her arms started to shut down and she couldn’t walk anymore, before the doctor that came to see her each month started prescribing her medicine that made her drowsy, that made her forget Harry’s name sometimes, and who he was, and what he was doing in her apartment. 

And he doesn’t know how long he sat there for, tears staining the sheets, tea fanning out across the floor and seeping into the wood, making it sticky. He just knows it hurt to breathe, to think, to touch her, or look at her, to do anything. And the more he tried to remember what it felt like to be held by her, to imagine the good things, the more the bad things started to seep through, too, the things he tried to push away.

The first time she collapsed in public and couldn’t get up again. Glass smashing when she would drop things, countless dinner plates and mugs lost to the twitch of her hands. Waking in the night to hear her crying, or to something breaking, or to the _thud_ of her falling out of bed and not being able to drag herself up to the mattress again, Harry treading tired and careful through the hallway to reassure her, to help her back under the sheets.

Harry at eighteen with his head in his hands, summer sun beating down on his neck through the window as he tried to ignore the urge to run away, hating himself for the very thought, hating himself for shutting his door sometimes and ignoring the sounds that came from down the hall, overwhelmed by how big it all felt, how much he felt like he couldn’t do. Harry at fifteen, almost burning down their apartment because he left the oil on the stove too long and it caught fire and his mother couldn’t communicate with him, smoke billowing upwards and clogging the roof, shaken to his very core. Harry at thirteen, kneeling up on a chair and watching his mother cook, watching his mother put clothes in the washer, watching her clean, so that he knew how to do it, too.

Harry at twelve, watching his father walk out the door, promising he’d be back with groceries in time for dinner, he and his mother sitting at the table, his mother with eyes downcast, because looking back, Harry’s sure that she knew that man was never coming home.

The times he’d wake in the mornings to help her change her clothes, to eat, and he’d be met with a scream, with panic, because some days she woke up and really couldn’t recognize him anymore, scratched at his arms with the little movement she had when he tried to dress her, knocking food and hot water to the floor as she struggled to move, and then minutes later, when Harry sat on his creaky bed with his tears in his eyes, knees to his chest, the quiet, calming call of _Harry_ floating down the hall, his mother looking at him like the previous half hour never even happened at all, like the flat didn’t smell like burnt toast and the street below. 

Some days, it felt like drowning. Some days, when she lay still and didn’t recognize him, when she stopped speaking all together, it felt like his room was a tank of toxic water, and he sat there and burned in the summer, hung his arms out the window and watched the street below and hated every thought that came to him, hated himself for wanting to stay, hated himself for wanting to go, especially then, when he saw his father’s face and then the slamming door.

Some days, he wished they never moved, that he never believed a world his father said about America, about the wonders there, the opportunity, the developments, the brand new life they could make away from the farm. _It was toxic. It was draining them. She’d get better if they drifted away from it all_. And then suddenly they were stuck, and his father ran, and Harry was twelve and terrified and left to pick up the slowly fragmenting pieces of his mother, slowly crumbling away into nothing, into an empty void of a person, a blank slate that starred up at him with no recognition for the things he’d done, or who he was, no sense of memory, of nostalgia, of melancholy when he read to her some nights, the very stories she used to tell him by candlelight, late, when the farm was quiet and the twilight bugs sung and she had her hands in his hair, her favourite place to love him.

Some nights, when she was asleep, someplace far away, Harry would lay next to her and shuffle down and ever so gently, without a sound, thread her fingers into his hair, and press his face into her hip. Just to pretend, just for a little while. To feel something other than nothing.

-

He wakes sobbing.

It’s not muffled, nor quiet, held in his chest. He doesn’t know how long it’s been going on, but he gasps awake like he’s breaking the surface of the water all over again, cheeks shiny-wet, stomach all knotted up, and he curls into himself slowly, a hand over his eyes as things coming rushing over him so suddenly it makes his vision blur, this gigantic, staggering wave of grief that knocks him on his back and grinds him down into the seabed. 

It takes him too long to realize that the edges of things are blurred yellow, that the candle has gone out but the lamp is on, that there’s a gentle weight by his side, and when he manages to peel his swollen lids open, Louis is sitting there, staring down at him, his own eyes wet with tears as he watches, and that almost makes it worse, has Harry crying harder, shame flaring up his cheeks at how loud he’s being.

Louis doesn’t touch him, doesn’t say a word, and Harry doesn’t know what he’s doing as he reaches out. He just needs something to hold onto, something other than himself to use for leverage for once, just something to feel like he isn’t drifting out all alone. He circles Louis’ wrist first, urging him closer. Their eyes meet.

That’s all it takes for Louis to draw Harry up and into his chest.

Harry grips him tight, hides his face away against the underside of Louis’ neck as he cries, back heaving under Louis’ flattened palm, rubbing there, hushing Harry gently, his own breathing stuttered and wet. Louis’ other hand cups the back of Harry’s neck, fingers brushing the hair at his nape. Harry slumps into the touch.

Finally, fingers curl into his hair, and he lets out another breath, tears soaking the collar of Louis’ sweater.

The thought is always there to greet him when he wakes each morning, whispered as a low, thoughtful hum along the dips of his spine, right up close to his ear. _Your mother is dead._ Sometimes it’s a breath, sometimes a shout, sometimes he blinks it away the moment his eyes peel open. Lately, he’s been shoving it down into the deepest part of his mind, slamming the door and swallowing the key. 

Now that thought, along with all the other things he trapped in that place, are slowly seeping out from under the cracks. And some of them are gone completely, fading away, their time in the dark making them hazy. Those dreamy memories from his childhood are disappearing, the simple times, the laughter, the radiant beam of her smile, replaced instead by that lifeless apartment, a distant day running through the fields substituted with the bustle of the city and the silence between them as they waited for the seconds to tick down. 

Harry can’t breathe, can’t think, everything cascading over him. There’s a prickling, pins and needles heat that flares up against his neck, a frantic panic fluttering his heart and curling putrid and wet against his ribs, like the seawater is still filling them and turning rotten, slowly making the parts of him that are left fade away. And that’s the other thing, he thinks, that he doesn’t even know which parts of him are _him_ anymore, that he never got to figure that out, that he spent all that time trying to be something else, curling into himself, reading books and watching the washer spin and– 

“Let it out, sweetheart, let it out.” Louis is whispering into his ear, lips on his temple, the words washing over Harry in waves, these soft assurances, thumb rubbing constant between Harry’s shoulders. “You’ll be okay. You’ll be alright.”

Harry can’t seem to stop crying, and he wonders how long Louis has been watching and waiting for this moment, if he could see it coming the second their eyes met for the first time in that tiny boat. That maybe Louis isn’t aloof as he seems. That he never has been, as he strokes Harry’s hair back from his sweaty face, that he’s understood Harry in a way that nobody else has, that he’s tried to give him space to grow, and now, crowded together in these messy sheets, Harry can’t let Louis go, can do nothing but hold on tight and listen to the words whispered to him, over and over, a mantra.

_It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault._

-

When he wakes again, it’s dark out.

They’ve fallen asleep together.

Louis is on his front, head tilted away, and Harry has shifted further down the bed, only just touching the pillows. His forehead feels heavy, eyes swollen when he blinks. The lamp is still on, but its fuzzy and dark, all grainy, soft textures, the blanket haphazard and tangled awkwardly where their bodies have come to rest.  

Louis’ hand is curled up underneath him, just by his side, and Harry runs his eyes over it, the soft scar that runs along the back of it, the sunspots, the fuzz of his sweater. Hesitantly, Harry reaches out across the barely there space to touch, following the fleshy pink of the scar from the space between Louis’ pointer and middle finger down to the nub of bone at his wrist. 

On the next upstroke, Louis turns to face him.

Harry freezes.

They stare at each other for a moment, Louis sleepy and quiet, Harry with what he’s sure is embarrassed bewilderment, eyes red-rimmed slits, then gradually, Louis shifts so he’s on his side, facing Harry properly. The sheets shift with him, blankets tangling up in their legs.

“How are you feeling?” Louis whispers. His mouth brushes the pillow as he speaks, a soft hush. Harry lowers his eyes. His lashes feel all sticky.

“Okay,” he murmurs. When he glances back up Louis is just watching him, and this close all the sharp things about him have gone softer, shadows rounding out the slope of his jawline, the fan of his lashes, pale eyes dimmed and gentle as he regards Harry carefully. This close, Harry can see the details, more freckles and sunspots, the stubble that’s starting to shadow the underside of Louis’ jaw. The smudge of his scar against the pillow. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” Louis says.

“I don’t know how,” Harry admits, meek. He looks away. “I don’t even know how to think about it.”

The sheets rustle soft, and then Louis’ fingers brush the underside of Harry’s wrist. A gentle encouragement. “Why don’t you start from the beginning?”

 _The beginning._ Harry wonders which beginning Louis means, if _the beginning_ even means much at all; if it’s his first memory as a boy, the memory of lingering smoke in his father’s office, the fields, sunset in summer, that forgotten day at the beach, or if it’s something more, if it’s the first time his mother said she didn’t feel quite up to running through the fields with him, the first time he and his father came inside to the smell of something burning, her body still in bed, hand over her forehead as she complained of a headache, her muscles sore, a new kind of flu, it had to be. Or maybe the beginning was the first muffled fight down the hall, Harry peeking one eye through the crack with his blanket draped over his thin shoulders, or the letters coming in the mail from far away, a promise of a new life, a better one, or if the beginning was really the moment they set foot on new soil, the wonder in his father’s eyes and the quiet knowing in his mother’s pale features.

 _The beginning,_ Harry thinks, closing his eyes, feeling Louis’ fingers brush his skin again, the lamplight brushing them over in dark gold, the wind outside and the waves and Cape Breton curled right up close, watching, waiting, with her bated, steady breath. _Why don’t you start from the beginning?_

Harry does.

He tells Louis everything he can, everything he remembers. The farm, the fields, the simple boyhood he had before things fell apart, before his parents started to fight, before his mum got sick, before the house smelt like smoke and his mum would come into his room late at night, cradle his head and brush his hair back and read _Black Beauty,_ and Harry would pretend he couldn’t see the red swell of her waterlines, just told her that he loved her and the books she read him.

He tells Louis about about their first few months in New York, how different it was, how afraid Harry became of the busy streets, of that small apartment, the constant noise at night instead of the dry, rustling fields. His dreams were filled with sirens and loud music and smashing glass, and sometimes he woke up with the distinct feeling that he was about to be hurt, or that someone would break in and come looking for him, or that he’d wake to find his window wide open. 

He tells Louis about their trip into town, a summer day, sweltering in a way that England never was, his cheeks sunburnt bright red, his mother sweating as they came back to the apartment, arms weighed down with groceries. His mother was still sick, had been ill intermittently since their arrival despite the doctors that came and went, the hospital visits and the strange diets and the sleepless nights, and Harry remembers it like something out of a book, the way she dropped the bags, various fruits and vegetables rolling out onto the street, down the sidewalk and onto the road, squished and exploding under car tires. 

The way she hit the ground and scraped her knees and her elbows all bloody.

He tells Louis about the fight he heard that night, the screaming match behind closed doors, the pounding of fists that came from the apartment above them, an obnoxious shout of _shut the fuck up!_ that had him curling his sheets up and over his head, facing the wall with tears in his eyes as he listened to the muffled argument. And then the next day, the apartment strangely empty, air heavy, his father ruffling his hair before he left and never came back.

He tells Louis about things getting worse, how each year, in the summer specifically, she would deteriorate more. The way she absolutely refused to be moved to a care home of any sort, a clinic, they way she refused to let Harry enter any kind of foster system, the way she fought to say she could take care of herself, and him. The way she started to teach him things he didn’t realize he needed yet, things that confused him when he watched kids ride their bikes down the sidewalk as he remained indoors, wandering around the apartment as if he were looking for something he didn’t quite know he lost.

He tells Louis that he soon began to forget the pieces of himself from his boyhood, that he became transfixed on helping her, caring for her, loving her. And that wasn’t the problem, because she was his mother, and he loved her unconditionally, just as she loved him, cared for him, told him as much every day, every time he tied her laces and tucked her in and cooked dinner under the low kitchen lights. 

The problem started when things started to deteriorate too fast for him to keep up with, when those monthly visits from nurses and worried doctors, the kinds that looked at him sitting in the corner with scrutiny, asked his mother every time if she wanted to come with them, if she wanted someone to care for Harry, to give him a proper home. _This is his home_ , she used to say, when she could still say it.

And then she couldn’t anymore, and those monthly visits continued, and Harry would say _this is my home_ with a bag of rocks weighing down his stomach, head ducked, the words harder to let go the older he got. It became harder not to fling himself from the windows, to throw open the front door and tumble down the stairs and out onto the street, to run and run and run until his legs gave out from underneath him. 

He tells Louis about the guilt that came with those thoughts, the nights he tossed and turned in bed, hating himself for wanting to run away, hating himself for everything, for not making her better, for wanting her to love him more, even though it wasn’t her fault; she couldn’t do anything about it, and he had to remind himself of that when her memory started to flicker, when she screamed at him and clawed at him and sobbed as he tried to feed her. _It isn’t her fault_ , he said to himself, even as she threatened to call the police from her spot on the bed, head thrashing back and forth. _She loves you. She still loves you so much._

“You never left?” Louis finally whispers, eyes wet. He’s still touching Harry’s wrist, thumb there now, their fingers almost interlaced. “Never?”

Harry shakes his head. “Not when she stopped walking. I couldn’t.”

“Harry…” Louis breathes.

“She was everything I had,” Harry says, small. “All I ever had, and I couldn’t just–. I couldn’t leave her to die. She was my mother.”

“But it destroyed you,” Louis says, voice breaking. Harry closes his prickling eyes. 

“I know, but I loved her,” Harry says. Tears start to spill over before he can stop them. “I gave everything I had to her and now she’s gone. She took every piece of me and I can’t get it back. I don’t even know who I am. I feel like I never–.”

He cuts himself off, presses the heel of his palm into his eye.

“You’re kind,” Louis says, curling closer. “You’re so kind, Harry. You’re observant, and full of heart, and you don’t even realize how much you draw others in. And you’re witty, funny, even if you don’t think it. You like Anna Sewell and Jane Austen and when you read you do this thing where you curl your thumbs into the pages. You wait until your tea is lukewarm to properly drink it all. You pick up on details that others are moving too fast to see. And you care more about the feelings of others before your own, before you even think of what any situation might mean for you. I can see your heart on your sleeve, when you let me see it.”

Harry stares at him, tears wobbly where they’re stuck. There’s this intense, steady flush crawling up over his neck, fingers curled in the sheets. Louis’ smile is barely there, so gentle, wan as he presses his thumb against Harry’s skin.

“I’ve never met anybody like you before,” he says. 

Harry inhales slowly. “I’m not anything special.”

“Didn’t say you were,” Louis says softly. “You’re just you. And I’ve never met anybody like you.”

Harry doesn’t know what to say to that. He can barely look Louis in the eye right now, his cheeks burning. It’s so quiet between them, just the wind, the lull of waves, moonlight resting on the window sill and peeking through the yellow gaps of the curtain. Slowly, ginger, Louis reaches out and brushes Harry’s hair from his eyes.

“I think you’re brave, too,” Louis says, breathed in the space between them. “You got through that all on your own, and I feel like we’re always taught to never do things on our own, y’know? That loneliness, being alone, isolated – it’s the surefire path to destruction. But sometimes I don’t know if I believe that.”

“Why?” Harry says, but it’s a mumble, eyes closing when Louis pushes his hair back again, fingertips gentle on Harry’s forehead.

“Well,” Louis starts, cautious. “Maybe, sometimes we can start to know ourselves better, the more we spend that time with ourselves. It doesn’t have to be so black and white, all alone or consumed by other people. And I…I’ve been alone for a long time. So fucking long. But at least I know myself, or at least I think I do, and try to.”

He’s still touching Harry’s face, almost absently now, like he’s forgotten his fingers are dragging gentle through Harry’s fringe. When Harry opens his eyes again, during the pause, Louis is watching him back, face turned into the pillow.

“It’s cost me a lot, and I sometimes wonder if I could take it back. If my family wouldn’t be broken to pieces,” Louis says, eyes downcast. “If my sister would still be alive.”

“Louis,” Harry whispers, heart kicking against his ribs. _Charlotte_. 

“Maybe you don’t know all the things that you are, yet,” Louis says. He looks back to Harry, face set. “But you know who you’re not, and who you don’t want to be. And I think that’s more important than anything else. You can grow and learn in so many ways, but knowing what you don’t want, knowing your values, your own worth when you have to stack it up against everything else around you, that’s what matters. You have that, Harry. Nothing can take that away, not a lonely day, not a loss. That’s all you.”

Harry feels himself tearing up again, and then the first little droplet slips, melting from the corner of his eye and cradling along the side of his nose. Louis brushes it away with his thumb, palm hovering over Harry’s cheek now. Harry can’t remember the last time he was this close to anybody, to have somebody else actively touching him, being careful with him, and the ache that blooms in his chest almost hurts, spreads to his fingers and his toes as he lets himself tip forward, forehead pressed to Louis’ chest, arms tucked up around his own.

“I’m happy I met you,” Harry whispers. It’s muffled into Louis’ sweater but he knows that Louis hears, feels the intake of his breath, the careful way he lets his arm fall over Harry’s shoulder, pulling him in.

Harry considers the word. _Happy_. He isn’t really sure what that feels like anymore. All he has are distant reflections, the melancholy, lost days, train rides, hands to the too-big sky as the sun set. But this, the surging heat in his belly now, the quiet simmer of reflecting over everything they’ve been through, everything Louis has done for him, it could be happiness; gratefulness, and trust. Feeling like he might actually, finally, belong somewhere.

A real home.

Louis tugs the sheet up around them, and all is warm and quiet, the squalls outside beginning to settle in to the sand. 

“Me, too.”

-

He feels like his body has been strung out, the next time his eyes flutter dazedly open. He’s on his stomach, face mushed against the pillow he’s gotten ahold of, and it’s late morning, the curtains open, pale light sweeping soft through the glaze. 

The rain has stopped.

With a soft breath, he puts his face into the pillow and flexes his stiff toes. The more he shifts, the more he notices the aches, the heaviness that cradles his forehead and nose, all blearly and snuffled. He tucks his face back into the crook of his arm, closes his eyes again, and tries to will the lingering of his dream away, the cold water, and the pressure on his chest, searching for a warm yellow light to lead him up from under the weight of it. 

He hears it then, as he settles into the stillness, the quiet _click-click_ that sounds almost like an undertone. Harry’s immediate thought is to turn over and look towards the window, skin prickling at the sound, but this is more metallic, a little more hollow sounding, and he peeks an eye open to actually look, this time, blinking away crusted sleep and the last bits of dew from a heavy rest.

Louis is sitting at his desk. Harry watches the dust filter up off the typewriter, pulse suddenly jolting to life.

“You’re writing,” he says, edged rough from sleep. Louis flinches as he looks over, fingers poised over the little keys.

“You’re awake,” he says back. Harry slides further down into the sheets, still tucked into his arm. 

They’re silent for a moment, and then Louis bites down on what might be a smile as he looks away, the stilted _click-click_ filling the space between them again. Harry watches his profile, the straight posture of his back, the idle tap of his foot each time he sets the paper back to the start of a new line.

“What are you writing?” Harry asks.

“A story,” Louis says, glancing over again, smiling when Harry rolls his eyes lightly and presses his forehead into his arm, hiding away.

“About what?” 

“Nothing,” Louis says, and the tone of his voice makes Harry look up, flushing cheeks hidden. “Nothing at all.”

Harry ducks his eyes, pulls the sheet up, and hums under his breath instead of responding. Soon, Louis lights his first cigarette of the day, hanging careful and puffing from his mouth as he writes, glancing Harry’s way every so often. Harry can’t help but wonder what’s going on inside his head, if the cogs are turning, what’s made them turn, why he’s decided to brush the dust away after what seems like so long. 

It makes something inside his chest go warm, and he keeps his face pressed to the pillow to try and will it away, unsure of why it feels like so much, so big, all at once. His head feels all over the place, drained from the night before, or from the early hours of this morning, rather, feeling everything all over again, new things on top of that, his life projected for Louis to see and sift his hands through, and to be so vulnerable, to shed everything and just _be_ , has him feeling shy and quiet, unable to do anything but watch from behind the shelter over his own body as Louis smokes and writes, both of them quiet and occupied in their own little words.

He isn’t sure what compels him to reach for the frayed carton of cigarettes on the bedside, the chipped, old lighter, cool in his palm, but he leans up on his elbows as he lights one and watches it start to smoulder, gun-grey smoke wafting up. He watches it float, and through the haze he catches Louis’ eye, looking on carefully, his own cigarette poised between his fingers now.

Harry brings it to his lips.

He’s never smoked, just like he’s never read Sartre or ordered a whiskey neat, never tied a knot or gutted a haddock or caught a lobster in a trap; it’s white-hot dust when it touches his lungs, barely inhaling the first time, just holding the smoke in his mouth before quickly letting it go, unsure, tasting the bitterness and holding it away again, watching the amber ring that burns towards his fingers.

Louis starts to type again, but he keeps looking Harry’s way, fingers at a stop-start as he presses down, moving almost in tandem with Harry’s inhales and exhales. Harry wonders how this looks, if he were to peek through the door and watch this moment back, something reflexive and strange. Him, bundled up in unfamiliar sheets, Louis’ sweater, Louis’ cigarettes, late morning cloud drifting up over them and making things pale and gentle. 

He puts the bud out on the ashtray and coughs lighty into the back of his hand.

It’s almost as though he can feel each steady press of Louis’ fingers, a _one-two-three-one-two-three_ waltz up his arm, along his chest, his jaw twitching each time Louis pauses to look at him; and Harry had thought it a joke, the way Louis had thrown the smile over his shoulder just before, when he said _nothing_ , but this doesn’t really feel like nothing. It feels deliberate, and careful, and Harry can’t see what Louis is writing, isn’t sure that he wants to, but he knows it’s about him. That Louis is making him into words.

And that, Louis putting him down on paper, building him into something, makes Harry’s chest flutter again, because maybe to himself, he doesn’t quite yet know who he is, what he wants, how he’s ever going to figure it out. But maybe Louis knows him, enough to look at him and find words to inspire. Maybe Harry is nothing to himself, yet, but being something to someone else is a feeling so foreign that he can’t seem to stop the swell of heat that rushes to the tips of his fingers. 

There’s so much that he wants to stay. There are so many things he needs to think about.

He closes his eyes and sinks back down into the sheets.

-

It feels like they’re waiting. For what, Harry doesn’t quite know. Some mornings he shuffles into the kitchen, face creased from the pillows, and Louis is staring out the window behind the counter, down the line of the beach with his hands cupped around a steaming mug, profile outlined in morning light. He jolts when he hears Harry’s footsteps, spills tea over his fingers and curses until Harry passes him a cloth. They don’t really talk about it, the flash of Louis’ eyes as he turns, the flit of them when he glances back up the beach. 

Harry asks, after a few mornings of this same routine, waking up in Louis’ sheets with his mind all foggy, nose running and sick. 

“It’s nothing,” Louis says, but that doesn’t really work anymore, the little words, _it’s okay_ and _it’s fine_ and _it’s nothing_.

“Please don’t lie to me,” Harry says softly, because he doesn’t want Louis to shut him out now, not after everything. He doesn’t want Louis to feel like he has to face this all on his own.

Louis puts his tea on the counter. “Fergus stopped by a few nights ago. Late, after you fell asleep.”

“Oh.” Harry leans against the counter beside him. “What did he say?”

“He apologized,” Louis says. He digs his thumb into a chip in the wood, right by Harry’s hip. “So did I. He said Wellard had come to the bar to ‘investigate’. Fergus warned him off, apparently.”

“Investigate,” Harry repeats.

“Mm,” Louis hums, arms tucked over his chest now, leaning beside Harry. “Sully wouldn’t have said anything about it, but I’m sure word somehow spread about what happened. I–. I’m just worried. I don’t want anything else to go wrong right now.”

Louis digs his thumb deeper into the chip, and on a whim, Harry slides his own hand closer, brushes their pinkies together until they link up. Louis stills his movement, finally meeting Harry’s eye.

“We’ll be okay,” Harry says. Slowly, Louis leans his head on Harry’s shoulder.

“I don’t want you to get hurt,” he whispers.

In the days that the storm clears, things feel on edge. Waiting for a knock at the door, waiting for the moment the house of cards they’ve so carefully, somehow, managed to stack into a little pile, will all come fluttering down again. Harry wakes in the middle of the night with wet eyes and a hand to his heaving chest, and when he sits up Louis is there by the edge of the bed, cast in candlelight, in the soft bulb of the lamp, reaching for him. 

He’ll whisper _I’m here, you’re here, we’re both right here_ , and then there’ll be a gentle hand on Harry’s shoulder, in his hair, a physical touch that grounds him to the here and now, that pulls him out from under the cold, slated press of the water, the dull, boxy apartment, the field in the summer. It takes him longer to fall back asleep after that, and sometimes Louis stays, and they talk, just low hums and whispers – and all the while, leaving forgotten touches, a brush to a wrist, a tug on a loose thread, watching each other in the half-dark. 

And Harry doesn’t have a name for this feeling, this new weight that feels like a wave that’s been looming in the distance for a while now, only just brushing the shore and sweeping up his back, over his shoulders and down his chest. Some nights, Harry falls back asleep and when he wakes Louis is nowhere to be found, often curled up on the couch, making tea in the kitchen with his nose to the glass. 

And sometimes, Harry wakes with his face pressed against the worn, soft knit of Louis’ sweater, the sheets awkward around their legs where they’ve tangled them up during the night, and Harry breathes it in, his nose brushing that safe place between Louis’ shoulder blades, the drifting scent of smoke, and tea leaves, and the salt. It’s as he wakes on these mornings that he feels the gush of that wave most, like the moment he opens his eyes and sees red wool, the fizzling, tickling brush of foam starts to gather at his neck, makes him feel heady and strange as he presses closer unconsciously, only really waking once Louis sits up and reaches for the carton on the bedside table, stumbling his way down the hall and out the front for an early cigarette.

There, left only with the impressions, Harry shuffles into the warmth Louis’ body leaves, closes his eyes, and pulls up the sheets.

Despite this new closeness, Harry can’t help but notice that some noons, Louis starts to drift. He spaces out, leaves the kettle on too long, pretends to read when they’re tucked up on the couch; but Harry can see it, the way he fiddles with the corners of the pages, staring hollow and distant down into the dark of the margin instead of reading the words either side. Harry wants to ask, to hold out a hand, to be somebody to turn to. 

But then Louis will get up and rekindle the fire or pour another cup of tea with his lashes downcast, and the words die slow and steady on Harry’s tongue. 

-

“Harry?”

The sheet is up around his shoulder, cheek tucked into a too-large jumper. It’s still dark.

Slow, bleary, Harry peels his eyes open. There’s a headache blooming gentle at the base of his skull, and he isn’t sure if he’s imagining the phantom chill of water down his spine, if it’s just another figment of his imagination as he comes to, aware now of the hand by his arm, the warm body next to him. 

“Mm?” he hums, sleepy and still distant. He presses his face into the pillow for a moment, fist curled up under his chin. 

Beside him, he can hear Louis breathing, and he pauses his own for a moment to listen, a brand new habit all on it’s own. He doesn’t remember waking up last night, nor falling back to sleep after the fact, but Louis is here, legs tangled up in the sheets again, and there’s a certain exhaustion Harry feels that leads him to believe he must have woken up. Then he feels the tackiness to his cheeks as he shifts, and he flushes, eyes closing again. 

He must have cried, still fast asleep, and Louis must have heard.

“Are you feeling okay?” Louis whispers. 

Harry slips further down into the sheets, further forward, feeling out for the warmth he knows is there. His knuckles brush Louis’ front.

“Yeah,” he murmurs. “I’m okay.”

The sheets shift, rising up a little higher around Harry’s back. It’s a cocoon. By the window, the first edges of blue-morning are starting to caress the curtains, all silk-aura and pale sun. It’s in these dreamy slices of pre-dawn that he often finds himself sinking completely, wondering what would happen if he never left this bed again, if Louis would stay, if they’d harbour warmth together; and it’s a strange thing to think, he knows it, but then Louis’ hand brushes his, their knees touching, and it doesn’t feel so strange at all, really.

“I want to go for a walk, today,” Louis says quietly, hesitant. Harry blinks up at him, just an outline in the shadowed room, their faces close. “To the cemetery.”

“Oh,” Harry breathes. 

“Will you come with me?” Louis asks. 

They watch each other for a moment, and it feels heavy, and Harry can’t look away. He tucks his thumb beside Louis’.

“Of course,” he says. 

It’s not until morning has risen all weak that they pull the sheets back. Harry doesn’t really know if he fell back asleep, just that his head feels lucid and someplace strange, that he shuffles into the warmth Louis’ body leaves as he gets up, and that Louis sees him do it.

Harry joins him on the stoop. They huddle together to watch the water, Harry with his tea, Louis with a slow-burning cigarette. The sunrise colours are back, and Harry closes his eyes when the rays start to slide atop the waves towards them, honey yellow on his cheeks, shining the tips of their worn down boots; the glow of it slants like a fine mist on the sand, Louis’ scar flushed pink when he tilts his chin and exhales, even the dark grey of smoke shot through with new translucence. 

Soon after, they’re walking. The apprehension waits like a numb creature at the pit of Harry’s stomach, waiting for the moment to wake and strike, his eyes darting about before he can stop them once they start to walk through town. This early, everything is still hushed, just the waves and the frontline slowly yawning to life, the wharf empty. It leaves room for stray thoughts, for imaginary footsteps following behind them, warped reflection in the glass, a quiet voice– 

Louis’ hand brushes his, their pinkies interlocking just for a moment, and when Harry looks over Louis is watching him back, eyes soft, this look of comfort. Harry inhales, exhales, and shakes the thoughts away.

They make one stop at a deserted, tiny general store. Louis picks out a bundle of pale flowers, all pastel petals and thin stalks, wrapped in pink plastic. Harry ignores the look the cashier gives them over the counter, that lingering, judgemental gaze over Louis’ scar as he pays, eyes downcast. They’re quick to leave, flowers cradled carefully in Louis’ hands.

In springs re-awakening, the treeline is supple and bulbed in patches of soft gold, crowded with dark greens, this play of colour and light; and under the shade, the little gravestones rest silent and still, some crumbled on the corners, others nested safe under drooping branches. It’s quiet in a different way, not like the deserted wharf, or the beach before the sun comes up, but like Cape Breton no longer exists the moment they shuffle through the tiny iron gate.

Breath held, Harry follows Louis with his hands deep in his pockets until they come to a slow stop towards the back of the rows. His eyes mist up as he reads the name on the plaque. As Louis places the flowers down gently, movements stiff.

They stand motionless for what feels like forever.

“It’s today,” Louis finally says, soft. “Ten years.”

Harry doesn’t hesitate when he reaches for Louis’ hand.

Distant, the wind whistles a hollow tune down the cliffside, seawind soft through their hair as they stare down at the old stone. Harry doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t think he could speak now if he tried. He just squeezes Louis’ hand tighter when he hears him inhale, bites at his own lip to keep the heat in his eyes at bay. 

“I used to stay up at night, y’know,” Louis starts, quiet, eyes to the plaque. “I’d stare at the ceiling and think about her – about how much I missed her, how long it would take for me to stop missing her so much it made me feel like I was dying from the inside.”

The breeze blows again, shakes the trees. Louis swallows.

“That day still hasn’t come,” he whispers. “Sometimes I wake up and it feels like I’m eighteen again.”

Louis wipes at his eye with his free hand and lets out a tremulous breath. Harry watches him, the pinch of his mouth and brows, the way his jaw keeps clenching up, trying to hold back the tears with each shuddery breath.

“What happened to her?” Harry asks, barely a whisper, because it feels so delicate, fragile enough to break with only a breath, and maybe he shouldn’t ask, chest aching as he lets the words go, but he can feel something between them now, the way Louis keeps squeezing his palm, and the memory Harry has of those nights at the bar, the dark look in Sully’s eyes, in the eyes of townsfolk, the Sherriff, all these details that feel like a puzzle with all the key pieces missing from the box.

“I told you that Sully’s got five boys, right?” Louis says, eyes downcast. “That’s all my dad ever wished for. He only got me, in the end, but he loved the girls. He always loved them so much, so did mom. Their little darlings, you know? Mom always went on about it, raising them right, watching the boats come back in to the wharf each morning from the kitchen window, spending all day inside. Learning to sew. Learning to cook. Being there for dad and I when we came back inshore.”

“Charlotte was never like that,” Louis says, smile faint and sad. “She used to try and run after me in the morning when I went out on the water. She followed me around everywhere, especially when she was little, y’know, like a lost puppy. But she was always anything but that, had this strong, sure heart to her that none of us could ever compare to. I’ll never forget the way she used to sneak out of the house and wait for us on the pier. Dad would be in all sorts, seeing her there all by herself, ‘specially in the winter. We’d bring the boat back in, waves and wind all over the place, and there was little Charlotte, still in her pajamas and one of my coats, legs hanging off the edge of the bloody pier.”

Harry laughs under his breath, eyes wet, and Louis does the same, thumb wiping at his cheek.

“She was a terror, an absolute terror, sometimes,” Louis continues, a wet laugh. “She just had this thing about wanting to know everything, be everywhere, explore every possibility. She would prod me and nag me all day to take her out on the boat in secret, sometime when dad wouldn’t see because he’d go mad if he knew.”

Louis smile fades gradually, mouth pinching up again. “That’s how it started, y’know, her wanting to be on the water. Mom started to smack her if she went to the wharf in the morning without anybody knowing. I remember getting home some mornings and the house would be so quiet, and mom and dad would fight about it, about what they would do with her. _A boat is no place for a woman_. That’s what mom used to say to us, to all of us, all the fucking time. It broke Charlotte’s heart. It made her refuse to sit and watch mom work around the house.”

“I used to read to her at night,” Louis says. He wipes at his eyes again. “She’d sneak into my room with a candle. The other girls didn’t care for it as much once they saw how dad hated me reading, but Charlotte always wanted a piece of whatever I was doing. She wanted to be under the covers, hearing all the secrets, living all these fantastic lives. We made up stories together when we were really young, these dreams of sailing around America, all the way across the world. I wrote her into everything I made, when she asked me to. She had such a vibrant imagination for things like that.”

Louis stops for a moment, and Harry feels his grip tighten, the mist in his eyes swelling up.

“You can stop,” Harry says, his own cheeks wet.

“No, it’s–.” Louis swallows, breath shuddery. “I should talk about it. I should. I can’t just hold it all in.”

Harry rubs his thumb over the back of Louis’ hand. _I’m here, you’re here, we’re both here._

“I told you that my dad and I never really got on,” Louis says. “There was always this pressure. Do more. Be more. Do as he said. Do nothing but work on that wretched fucking boat until my hands bled. And you have to understand that I would do that for the rest of my life if it meant keeping my sisters in that house, and keeping them healthy, taking care of them once my parents were gone. The responsibility of that wasn’t what did it. They’re my girls. Nothing should have been worth compromising their happiness.”

“But I realized that being out on the water, that wasn’t the life I wanted. There were other ways I could still be there for them, still cherish them. Dad never understood that. He resented me for it, hated me, made my life hell every time I so much as thought about leaving this place. I tried to hide that from the girls, but Charlotte always saw through my facade. She was so sharp, y’know. And I never wanted to lie to her, to any of them, about how I felt.”

“We confided in each other. Felicite grew to resent the strain I put on things, and the twins were still too young to understand it, when everything started to unravel. But Lottie was always there, always had a book tucked under her sweater, a way to try and cheer us both up. It didn’t stop me from feeling like I was fucking our entire family up. I tried to stop, I tried to make things better between my dad and I. But he never wanted any of it, none of my apologies, my attempts to mend our relationship. He never cared.”

“Charlotte cared too much,” Louis whispers. “She cared so much about everything, about everyone, about what they all thought of her, and of me. And she was so young, she had so much love to give, and to have that shut down all the time, it broke her heart. She hated being stuck in that house. She never understood why we lived on the beach but couldn’t spend all day in the water. Why it was hell on earth if she ever tried to set foot into that boat. And she tried so many times, had dad in absolute fits of fucking rage when she’d run down the pier and jump in after us.”

“And I was so stuck in this bubble,” Louis says, closing his eyes. “I was full of so much hate, so much confusion and hurt, I could never think of anything but what I was going to do, how I could escape this place without leaving my sisters behind, leaving them to deal with everything that would happen in the aftermath of that. I was so concerned with my own fucking feelings but Charlotte always gave everyone else around her the time of day before she ever cared about herself.”

“I didn’t even see it,” Louis says, and his voice is wet now, tight as more tears come. “Her own brother, the one person she trusted to take care of her properly, and I was too busy with my head in the clouds, being angry at my parents, being angry at the whole world, to see that she was barely hanging on. She was so young and confused and I just–”

“Louis,” Harry says, trying to calm him, chest aching at the way Louis’ eyes spill over.

“I still remember the day it happened so clearly,” he says, palm wiping messily at his cheeks. “The weather was miserable. Dad and I’d come off the boat and had this terrible argument at the house, something I managed to fuck up with the lobster traps again, not setting them right, losing a buoy, never doing what he told me. I was a failure of a son, of a brother. I had my head on backwards. He screamed the whole place down with the girls in the next room over.”

“It wasn’t until the late afternoon that she knocked on the door. She begged me to take her out on the boat, just once, just this one time. I hated my dad so much, so fucking much. She insisted. She said that she didn’t care what happened if dad found out, that he couldn’t do anything. And I was so upset, so mad with him already. I just said fuck it, I’ll take you, and the way she smiled at me, how happy she looked that she’d finally get to go–”

He cuts himself off and shakes his head, running his free hand through is hair roughly.

“So we snuck out. There was nobody at the wharf, nobody to stop us. I shot us out over the reef and she stood with her arms out wide, wind in her hair. She looked so happy. I’d never seen her smile so much, and I can still see it, y’know, the way she turned to look at me when we stopped, when I showed her how to set the traps, let her wear my gloves and knot all the ropes and send the buoys over the edge. She didn’t care that it was raining and that the wind felt like it was going to knock us over. The swell was awful but she said she didn’t mind, that she liked the way it felt to get swept up, and that made me laugh, because of course she’d love that. Of course she’d never get seasick, not her.”

“She got so confident, said she could do it herself,” Louis says. “I turned away just for a second, just to get another pair of gloves. Just for a second.”

Harry closes his eyes, dreading the words.

“I heard the trap go. I heard it hit the water,” Louis whispers. “But then I turned around and the trap was still there. And she was gone.”

“God,” Harry breathes. “I’m so sorry.”

“I just stood there like a fucking idiot,” Louis says. “I didn’t–. I couldn’t even comprehend it. And she’d taken off her coat so I couldn’t see her in the water. The swell just swallowed her up and took her. It just _took her_. I couldn’t do anything, I couldn’t go in after her. I stayed out in the boat for so long just screaming out for her. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to go back in, because if I went in without her that made it real. I didn’t want it to be real.”

“They were all waiting, when I brought the boat back. The looks on their faces when they saw me, when they saw Charlotte wasn’t there–. Dad grabbed me by the front and tore me to pieces, he screamed at me, demanded I tell him where she was. I couldn’t say it. I didn’t know how. I just remember crying, I remember the girls being terrified. Mom didn’t say anything. She had to walk away.”

Harry pulls him in then, can’t bare not to any longer, not when Louis’ hands start to shake, entire face crumbling. It comes to him all at once, thinking of himself under the water, the way Louis had grasped him, the panic there as he plucked Harry up from under the swell, and then he thinks back further, all those times out on the boat that he felt pinned by Louis’ gaze, unable to move, and he wonders if that was intentional all along, to keep him safe, to keep him close.

“They searched for days,” Louis continues, muffled into Harry’s coat. “They found her washed up on the cliffs a few kilometres away. I still remember the look on my dad’s face, that day, when we got driven to the site and saw her. It was so awful. I still have nightmares about it, about all of it.”

“I’m so sorry,” Harry repeats. He feels useless, like nothing he can say could ever be enough. He just holds Louis closer, tries to be there in any way that he can be. Louis has a vice grip around him.

“There was this whole investigation,” Louis continues. “Into me, my family, all of Cape Breton. And this place, it breeds ignorance and rumours like wildfire, seeks people out like a spotlight. I got taken into custody. They thought that I pushed her in, that I was jealous, that I was acting out. They took one look at my face and thought that I was insane, that I was a monster.”

“No,” Harry says, shaking his head. “No.”

“They kept the case running for months. It felt like it would never fucking end,” Louis says. “They couldn’t charge me, but they had me put on watch. Wellard had me on a probation, which I’m sure wasn’t even fucking legal for him to do. I couldn’t leave Cape Breton. I couldn’t apply for universities outside of the state. I couldn’t work with children.”

“My parents stayed for six months before they packed up and left. They couldn’t do it anymore, and the girls resented me, resented everything. Their sister was dead, their brother a suspected murderer. So they all left, spread themselves across Ontario and just left me here without an out. Both my parents are gone now. Cancer. And they left the house and everything that comes along with it to me, that stupid boat, that fucking slip at the pier. All of it. And I’ve been stuck here, dragging through each day, going out there because I feel like it’s all I can do to make up for the mess I caused.”

“But it wasn’t your fault,” Harry says. “You can’t blame yourself for that. You can’t.”

“If I had of just done my part.” Louis shakes his head, face buried in Harry’s coat. “If I hadn’t of been so fucking selfish–”

“But–”

“You have to understand,” Louis says, pulling back now, hands on Harry’s lapels. “Everything about this town exists in a time capsule. In one big cycle. Nothing changes. And the people that try and make changes, that start to drift out of this perfect circle that’s been made, there’s no room for them. I was one of those people, Harry. I still am, despite everything. I should have just stayed in my place.”

“That’s not fair,” Harry says, however naive it may be, however superfluous a thing it is to say. His own hands find Louis’ coat, the two of them holding on to each other. “You can’t blame yourself for that.”

“But I do,” Louis says, eyes shiny. “I always will.”

They stare wordlessly at each other. Cape Breton is waking behind them, the low curl of the swell flushing up the beach, children playing in the sand as they watch the silhouettes of the trawlers through the spring mist. All of that feels far away right now, every familiar thing Harry’s come to know about this place like a vague memory as he looks at the hurt in Louis’ eyes and feels this strange sense of understanding wash over him, that flush of anger and frustration fading to something he’s felt before but couldn’t put a finger on, that very first night at the bar, standing out in the cold snow and not being able to say a word.

Harry doesn’t know what to say, only this time, the silence is what he knows Louis needs. There’s nothing he can say right now to change this, and it wouldn’t be right of him to try and change it. He can still hear Louis’ voice in his ear, _it’s not your fault_ , over and over again, but Harry doesn’t know if he’ll ever think any different, if he’ll ever imagine his mother’s face and feel anything but a bone-crushing guilt. 

And there, that shame, that indescribable hurt that’s always going to be a piece of him, is what he knows Louis is feeling now, what they’ve both felt all this time, a moment between two people that’s terrifying to share; but to share it, to have someone else understand, to be shown that fractured, broken part of a person, it brings this sudden moment of clarity to Harry’s mind.

He pulls Louis in again, as close as he can, and closes his eyes.

“I’m here,” he whispers, because that’s all he needs to say, because that’s all he ever wanted to hear. What Louis has already given him. “I’m here for you.”

Louis lets out a breath and wraps his arms firmly around Harry’s waist. 

-

That afternoon, they visit the wharf.

It’s quiet, and nobody bothers them, and Harry keeps close enough to Louis’ side that by the time they’re walking along the pier, their arms are linked together. _Arlo_ waits sleeping and silent, still tied up flush to the beams from the storm. Louis doesn’t get in right away. He smokes a cigarette first, staring down onto the deck, up along the spray rail, feet trailing until they come to a stop at the stern.

“They painted over it, after” Louis says. Harry looks at the chipped print, the once sleek-black _Arlo_ that’s now faded. The texture of white paint either side of _A_ and _O_. 

Silently, they untie the knots, and once they float out into the harbour, Louis veers them away from their usual path, heading out towards the cliffs instead. 

The sun’s coming down now, balmy and warm where it’s filtering through the clouds. When the rays hit the water things turn gold and yellow-toned, glossy like a flame, like a soft reflection on a window. Harry feels it then, as he stands by Louis’ side at the stern and watches the water. If he closes his eyes he can almost imagine the wind and the rain, a heavy squall from months before, he and Louis standing here just as they are now.

And then he can see further, a year back, the year before, further and further until he can imagine Louis as a boy in an oversized coat and too-big boots, his wide eyes and smooth face and his father at the wheel. Louis’ father and his father on this same path, watching the water, the cliffs, seeing the spring sun go down.

They turn back towards the wharf, gentle wake behind them, and Harry watches the sun slant where it hits the rocks, then back to Louis’ face. There’s something in his eyes. Something different, all brand new. 

Just for them, and this moment, and nothing that’s come before.

-

Louis brings the boxes down the following morning.

It’s with a heavy blink that Harry wakes, cheek squished against the pillow, the gentle _thud_ of cardboard on the floor; and the cupboard door is propped open, Louis in a bulky sweater, standing atop a stack of thick, hardbound books, slowly lowering dust-covered boxes down from the top shelf. 

“What’re you doing?” Harry murmurs, all sleep-thick as he sits up, sheets puddled on his hips.

Louis glances over, brushes the back of his nose with his knuckles. “Something I should have done years ago.”

Harry watches him pull the boxes down, some small, some wide and large, all frayed tape and fuzzy edges, old marker barely legible on the sides. _Summer ‘54, Winter Season ‘57_ , and at the front, the tape already half torn, _Spring ‘58._ The curtain is parted, morning sun beaming through, igniting all the disturbed dust into little stars and sunspots, and Harry watches them spin and settle, spin and settle, shifts his arm along the sheets to see the tiny puff of physical sun that moves around him like lapping water. 

The sound of ripping tape brings Harry out of his reverie. Louis sits cross legged by the opening of the cupboard, mangled tape being rolled into a ball between his palms. Harry watches him sift through the box, watches the soft, sad smile that pulls at his features when he extracts a thick envelope and lifts the flap, thick card falling out into his hand.

“Come look,” he says quietly, eyes not leaving whatever he’s found.

Slowly, bones tired, Harry tucks his arms around his middle and crosses the room. He joins Louis on the floor, their knees knocking.

“What a mug,” Louis says, and Harry peers down at the photograph that’s held out to him, a helpless smile curling up his mouth.

It’s Louis, young, long-haired, swimming in a coat and unlaced boots, sat in the sand with a collection of grains in each palm. He’s letting them go, and the picture almost seems blurred by it, an overcast day. It’s strange to see his face without the scar there, two perfectly rosy cheeks, round with youth. Harry laughs softly under his breath, watching Louis flick through the other pictures, pictures of his sisters, little snippets of the wharf, the kitchen, all these tiny memories captured.

The box is filled with nondescript things that once had meaning, an old blanket, a faded toy, a subscription magazine, old Christmas decorations and cards. One by one, they sort through the pictures, the boxes. Often Louis will pause as they flick through the photographs, thumb tracing faces Harry doesn’t know; one of Louis and another boy, the two of them grinning with their arms around each others shoulders at the edge of the wharf, _Arlo_ behind them, still labelled as a sleek _Charlotte,_ the scar on Louis’ cheek dark and new. Another of Louis surrounded by a group of men, fishmerman, the man to Louis’ left that Harry can only assume is his father with a firm hand on his son’s shoulder, face stoic. _Winter season begins_ , it’s labelled on the back in faded pencil. 

The same man at the bar, a photo of him sitting with a distinctly younger looking Fergus, undeniably brothers, those pale eyes; more of Louis and his father by the wharf, never a smile on either of their faces when they’re in the same picture. Louis’ father with a twin balanced on each knee, pulling faces, Louis’ father at the bar again, surrounded by salt-cracked figures, Louis’ father with friends, familiar faces that Harry has seen along the beach, Kenna, the women who guard the stoops on the frontline. Louis’ father by the window, with his wife by the fire, a blurred, shaky capture of bulbed Christmas lights. 

And then there’s Charlotte, a miniature version of Louis if Harry ever saw one, heart-shaped face and big eyes and Harry knows what Louis was talking about, the way he described her, larger than life and a big heart; she photographs that way, somehow, pale eyes so open, a smile that looks like she’s gotten away with every little tiff she’s ever managed to start, and her and Louis together, tucked under blankets, hands held along the stretch of the beach, drowning in too-big coats, it has Harry’s eyes growing a little wet, has him shifting his hand to brush his knuckles against Louis’ leg. 

There’s a hesitance in Louis’ hands, as he starts to open the smaller boxes. They aren’t dated, but Harry has a feeling there’s a reason for that, almost a familiarity to Louis’ movements as he gently pulls back the tape, hands dipping in like cupping water in between palms, and with slow movements he pulls out yellowed paper, some with faded drawings around the words, the bottom of the pages sometimes filled with a landscape, a scrawl of the beach, the mountainside, someplace far away, a fantasy.

There are so many stories, so many little slips of paper, some half-full with rushed poetry, others detailed, stapled and stuck together. Soon, the floor around them becomes a mess of paper and envelopes, the heady smell of it tickling Harry’s nose, that kept-in-the-draw smell he aches for, surrounding and submerging them completely.

Louis barely breathes a word. 

With careful hands, Harry continues to sift through the pictures. He’s in awe of it, almost, all these little moments and memories captured eternally, almost a preservation. A time capsule. There are a few family photos in the mix, most of them taken when all the children were young, Louis with his chest puffed out, small hands around his sisters with care and protection. He’s the spitting image of his mother, but his eyes are no doubt his father’s, impossible to miss, all of his sisters the same. 

The boy from the wharf appears a few times, his face vaguely familiar to Harry for reasons he can’t explain, the more he sees of him, the light hair and the hazel-like eyes. The boy and Louis as teenagers in _Arlo_ , taken from the pier above, the two of them by the kitchen table, and then a place Harry doesn’t recognize, a home along the frontline, if the sea-fog outside the window is anything to go by. Some in shaky black and white, others in dreamy colour. One of them in a living room that isn’t Louis’ own, both looking up from where they’re squished on the couch, books in hand.

“Who’s this?” Harry asks, holding the photo out for Louis to see.

Louis looks up from the paper in his hands, fingers tracing light around the drawing at the bottom, a shaky depiction of _The Charlotte_ at sea. A look of wan nostalgia flickers into Louis’ eyes, mouth quirking as he takes the photo from Harry’s hands gently. 

“James,” Louis says, thumb brushing the boy’s face. “We would go to the library together. His parents were a little more open to the idea of us reading. I used to go there after we’d been out in the boat, sometimes. It was a nice little haven, while it lasted, y’know. He was lovely.”

Harry feels something warm burn in his stomach, and he wonders if Louis feels it too, a rosy pink flushing up his cheeks as he lowers the photo, almost shaking himself into looking back to the paper in his hands. Harry watches him do it, the shutter-like motion that sweeps over Louis’ face as he flicks a page.

Harry reaches for the next envelope, throat thick.

All of this feels so important. Harry doesn’t even know how to pinpoint it, how to begin unravelling everything he feels, wondering what’s going through Louis’ head as they unpack the years of his life. Part of him hurts, yearns for his own dust-covered boxes and sunspotted pictures, a bright, warm-yellow blur of the field and the clear sky, and he’s sure that they exist somewhere, trapped in the attic of the old house, a frame left facedown on his bedside table in the apartment. 

The other part of him almost wonders if it’s better not to be able to see it, to just let himself remember what he wants to remember, to see what he wants to see, to try and mend from the inside, from the thoughts and feelings he can piece together. He doesn’t know if he wants the puzzle in front of him or on the inside. But this, the sifting, the physical touch, this feels like something Louis needs, to see the light in his sister’s eyes, to know that there was something beyond the hurt and the heartache that slowly tainted their home. A time before things went bad, captured forever in a crystal ball, warm to the touch, all kaleidoscope gold and ethereal. 

Harry finds it then, tucked into an envelope from the summer before she died. _Our precious Charlotte,_ written loopy and soft on the back. She’s on the stoop, her sisters in shot as a sunburnt arm, a ponytail, a billowed skirt, but her face is centred, and she’s smiling wide, almost caught in a laugh, sand on her pink collar bones, hair in disarray, a sunbeam all on her own.

“She’s beautiful,” Harry whispers, stomach curling the longer he looks, and then he feels Louis’ fingers at his wrist, his head on Harry’s shoulder as they look down at it. “I can feel her warmth.”

“I remember taking this,” Louis says, and his voice is wet, thin. “We’d just had a race up the beach. She won, of course. She couldn’t stop smiling, made up this story about how she’d run the beach until she dug down to the sea with her footprints, she’s run around the whole world and see it all, never stopping.”

Harry smiles softly, vision blurring a little. “She reminds me of you.”

“She’s got miles on me.”

“No.” Harry shakes his head, gentle, thumb at Louis’ knee. “She does. The way you talk about her, I can feel that in you. You showed her all these ways to use her imagination, all these stories to let her be wild and free however she wanted. That’s special.”

Louis’ face tucks further into Harry’s shoulder, and gradually, Harry’s lets his cheek rest atop Louis’ head, the two of them resting together, eyes wet, Louis silent as he breathes slow and measured. In the distance, Harry feels that oncoming wave again, can hear that warm fizzle, that buzzing in his fingertips.

“And I think she’d be proud of you,” Harry continues quietly, the words escaping before he can stop them, and he doesn’t want to stop them this time, finds heat at his neck as he speaks. “The way you’re still going, that you stayed, for them. That you could have left and gave it all up, but you’re still here. Persevering, and not letting anybody tell you who to be, or what to feel. And you should know that I admire you for that, and I…I’m fond of you, and you make me feel like I have something to belong to, and to become. I can’t let you think nothing of yourself when I think so much of you. When I know she’d think more than the world of you.” 

He finds Louis’ hand, rests his fingers in the gaps between Louis’ own.

“You’re a good person,” he whispers, ernest. “You have a good heart.”

Louis pulls away a little, facing Harry fully, and when Harry meets his eye carefully, he finds that Louis’ are shiny, full, brows pinched as he stares right back, something akin to a revelation passing over his features, something Harry feels in his chest when Louis blinks, lashes gone clumped.

“It’s been so long since I cared about anyone,” he says. “But I care about you. And I know that people always say you can’t care for others if you don’t care about yourself first. You make me want to self-preserve. You make me want to be better, to be kind, so I can care better for you. You showed all of that to me, Harry. I don’t think you understand what–.”

Louis stops, lips pulling into his mouth for a moment, eyes cutting away as he takes in a breath.

“I used to think about jumping off that boat every day. I didn’t want to wake up,” he says, and Harry shakes his head, squeezes Louis’ hand tighter as he speaks. “And now you’re here, and you’ve managed to show me so much. You don’t even realize what you’ve done, Harry. You changed everything the second you stepped foot on that wharf.”

“Louis,” Harry says, voice edged. The lights coming in around them, late morning saying it’s goodbye to dawn, and in the pale yellows that consume them Louis’ eyes shine, his face shines, all these parts of him buried in the sand so long emerged and carved out from the wind, brand new, and Harry, too, hidden from that wind, now here, unrecognizable in the mirror, in the reflection of a warped window, all for the right reasons, to begin again, to start anew, to be him.

“And I refuse to make those stupid, childish mistakes again, to trap myself in this box that I could never get out of,” Louis says, fingers curling against Harry’s. “And if you stay–”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Harry says, the words falling from his mouth. “I don’t want to go.”

“Please, don’t,” Louis whispers. “It’d be empty without you. But, I–. I don’t want to trap you, or make you feel like I’m trying to save you from yourself, or to have you put that reliance on me.”

“It’s like you said,” Harry says, trying to show Louis he understands, to keep their eyes locked. “About doing things alone sometimes, and knowing what I don’t want. And you’re right. I don’t want you to rebuild me, or save me, not in the way you mean. But to have you there to help me, for us to work together and not through each other, that’s it. I don’t want to be burnt through and left in the dust.”

They stare at each other, chests moving in tandem, surrounded by memories and the low whistle of the wind brushing Cape Breton’s cliffs, this tiny, quiet pocket tucked away from the rest of the world, and Louis’ hand is in his, thumb brushing the back of Harry’s own, his scar slicked pink, everything between them running hot; and there’s the wave, the seafoam curling gentle like a barrel over them, warm-wet, that flurry, that crawling up Harry’s spine that makes his neck prickle.

“Then what do you want?” Louis says, and Harry lets the last of it go, let’s the wave come down, feels it pull everything that clings back into the swell.

“To be loved.”

There’s a beat, the words hanging between them, and then Louis surges forward.

Harry lets out a shuddered breath, eyes widening and then closing when their lips touch, a fumble of pressure. It’s over within a second. Harry is left chasing the feeling, his heart leaping up into his throat, beating wildly, fingers starting to tremble. His face burns. Louis reels away with wide eyes, this look of alarm passing over his features as he starts to put space between them.

“I’m sorry,” he rasps, shaky. He rubs a distressed hand over his cheek, eyes cutting to the floor. “I shouldn't have–. I don’t–”

His breaths are heavy, and he shakes his head, makes to stand.

Dazed, Harry reaches out and grabs Louis’ arm, firm, keeping him still. They watch each other, breathless, Louis’ gaze full of fear, now, but Harry refuses to look away, can hardly even process his thoughts, lips tingling from the pressure, this whirlwind in his head spinning and spinning and spinning, but outside of himself it’s still so quiet, like a word could shatter everything. 

And he remembers that morning on the wharf, Louis facing the sea, that cigarette pinched between his fingers, and Harry recalls that feeling, the delicacy, being so tired, so exhausted within himself that he wanted Louis to shatter it all, break it to pieces, crush it into tiny fragments and let Harry finally crawl out from beneath the cracks in the rubble. 

“Louis,” he whispers, and it’s so, so quiet. But it’s enough. 

It breaks.

Their mouths meet again, gentle at first, despite the rush of breath that escapes them, the curl of fingers in sweaters, the bump of their noses as they get close. The warmth of it hits Harry first, the overwhelming heat of being this close to somebody, of having such intimacy, and then comes the shudders, the spine-prickling, the goosebumps along his arms and neck when his bottom lip gets caught soft between Louis’ own for a moment, when a palm finds his jaw, fingers in his hair. Harry’s hands reach Louis’ body, his hip, his chest, and there, finally, palm flat over his heart, feeling it beat. He curls his fingers into Louis’ sweater, knuckles against his ribs, slotted there like a key.

And maybe he finally understands it now, what the words in books always spent pages and pages spilling over, words dripping full of heart and heat, slathered there for all to see, this intensity, the rawness; finding God, losing God, all within that same deadly breath, reborn and taken away, this infinite, spellbound place, the crystal ball gone hot to the touch, the sunbeam through the cloud like the gloss on a window, on a frame, on a blurry photograph.

And they’re surrounded by it, the yellow light, pages and pages of stories made up, galaxies far away, impossible beginnings, impossible endings, all these things that could never exist, that don’t except for the ways in which they truly do, no matter their place, in their heads or their hearts or in the real world; they still exist, are still felt, still cherished, and Harry feels it, then, feels the heat and the press of a distant dream, the English summertime and pebble shores and the one hundred yesterday’s veiled behind the dreamy tears of the todays he’s yet to face, felt forever, kept forever.

_Loved. Loved. Loved._

And the afternoon comes, and with it the sun, and spring is truly alive now, and the boat coasts the waves, the day calm, ocean going onwards, their hands clasped. They drift the dreamy reef and go and go and go, the cliffs distant, the wide mouth of the harbour, that horseshoe theirs for the taking, and beside him Louis smiles, hand tight at _Arlo’s_ side as he dips down to the water and runs his fingers in the wake, that shiny iridescence, that same glow on his scar, and this is permanence, Harry thinks, watching Louis turn to face him, watching the sun hit the water, all the peaches and golds. 

Their eyes meet. Harry’s smile takes over his whole face, warm and achingly real, and then Louis is there, arms around Harry’s neck as _Arlo_ floats to a gentle stop, the water hushed, so careful around them, and this, removed from what was, what’s going to be, he understands it, now. Being part of their own small infinity within the time capsule around them, their own pace, their own home. Belonging in each other. Foreheads touching, seawind on his cheeks, Harry closes his eyes and breathes it in.

The boat rocks steady. He can feel it all.

-

_I wonder if you’ll wake, soon._

_I wonder so much about you._

_I wonder if you know I wonder._

_I felt your heart. I swear I didn’t mean to. But you moved, turned light, and there, right there-there-there, I felt it. I imagined it warm. I wondered some more. The sun has come in and now still I wonder about you, and your heart, and I hope you don’t mind my wondering._

_I hope you don’t mind my sheets, my smoke; I mind it. I mind so much and I’ve seen you notice it. You notice everything. Perhaps even my wondering._

_I hope you see you’re not a husk, not an ivory white of an elephant tusk sucked dry and hollow and cracked._

_I hope you see_

_You’re awake. You’re looking right at me. It’s not nothing._

_I hope you see yourself the way I see you. All your parts, all your pieces, I know you push and prod them. But it’s you, all together, still._

_You’re smoking my cigarettes. Your mouth is pink. Behind you the sky is grey but the sun still touches you the way in which I wish to touch you. Soft. Like a caress. I’m so terrified to break you, to taint your good with all the bad places my hands have been._

_I hope you know how much you terrify me, that you understand why I sometimes push, why I hide, and hurt. I would never forgive myself if I didn’t hide and I hurt you. All I want to project to you is affection, and shelter you in what’s left of my heart._

_I hope you see the light you carry with you. You’re falling back asleep, now. You’re sleeping in my sheets._

_I hope you don’t mind the way I wonder._

_I wonder if you wonder, too._

_I hope you do._

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> i have no idea what to write here bc nothing feels like enough but if u made it to the end thank u so much for taking the time to read this. the whole concept for this fic has been in my head for a while now, and after having a really tough year it felt like the fic that i needed to get out before everything else that's on my mind.
> 
> as always, i appreciate ur feedback so much, so feel free to drop a comment down below or come see me over on tumblr!! i made a lil post for this fic [here.](http://fondleeds.tumblr.com/post/179381076880/shelter-as-we-go-by-fondleeds-louis-looks-at-him) playlist [here.](https://open.spotify.com/user/gonewilde/playlist/6ZSCDAH2temC7K0byU5Fxe?si=N7dRHhK_SXWkbDsljaXugQ)
> 
> again thank u guys so much for ur love, ur the best
> 
> ♡♡♡


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